Robotic Calibration Based on Haptic Feedback Improves Sim-to-Real Transfer

Abstract: When inverse kinematics (IK) is adopted to control robotic arms in manipulation tasks, there is often a discrepancy between the end effector (EE) position of the robot model in the simulator and the physical EE in reality. In most robotic scenarios with sim-to-real transfer, we have information about joint positions in both simulation and reality, but the EE position is only available in simulation. We developed a novel method to overcome this difficulty based on haptic feedback calibration, using a touchscreen in front of the robot that provides information on the EE position in the real environment. During the calibration procedure, the robot touches specific points on the screen, and the information is stored. In the next stage, we build a transformation function from the data based on linear transformation and neural networks that is capable of outputting all missing variables from any partial input (simulated/real joint/EE position). Our results demonstrate that a fully nonlinear neural network model performs best, significantly reducing positioning errors.