Best way to integrate a prismatic joint with MoveIt!

Hi Guys,

I’m currently building a “service robot” based on a 6 DOF arm and a mecanum base. The hardware’s pretty much done as well as the robot arm’s MoveIt! configuration: https://github.com/grassjelly/ros_braccio_moveit .

Now I want to add a vertical linear actuator ( prismatic joint ) so the arm’s height can be adjusted. Just wondering what would be the best approach in doing this?

Should I add the prismatic joint in the MoveIt configuration as part of the arm group? Does the default kinematics solver support this?

Or create a separate controller for the linear actuator? This probably means I need to call an actionlib to move the linear actuator first then call the MoveIt API when I want to pick up an object?

Thanks in advance! :smiley: Cheers!

Hiya,

Most mobile manipulators have a prismatic joint in a similar configuration:
PR2, Tiago, Fetch, etc.

Just add a controller for it and as long as you have the joint trajectory
controller interface for both robots it will work out just fine. Of course
you have to add it to the urdf and also to the moveit configuration.

Look at any of said robots for examples :wink:

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