Robotics · Academic project

Delta robot
parallel manipulator

A three-degree-of-freedom parallel robot, explored through ROS 2, inverse kinematics, and an interactive browser simulator.

Context
RWTH summer school, 2025
Methods & tools
ROS 2 Jazzy · C++ · Python · React
Status
Browser simulator available
RViz visualization of the delta robot, showing three actuated arms, the shared end-effector platform, and red, green, and blue world-frame axes
Figure 01   The delta robot in RViz. Robot CAD and URDF: course material of RWTH International Academy / IGMR, RWTH Aachen University.

The mechanism

Three motors at the base position a shared end-effector through coordinated arm trajectories. The project connects the robot’s geometry to working software: inverse kinematics, joint-state publishing, and trajectory execution.

It began at the Robot Operating Systems Essentials summer school (28 July–10 August 2025), offered by RWTH International Academy and academically conducted by IGMR, RWTH Aachen University, with Universal Robots as industry partner.

My contribution

  • Co-wrote the inverse-kinematics solution with Armando Rodriguez and completed the IK service, joint-state publisher, trajectory action server, and pseudo-Arduino emulator.
  • Migrated the workspace from ROS 2 Humble to Jazzy, and built a FastAPI + React dashboard for live state, waypoint sequences, and demo presets.
  • Added the CAD-to-glTF pipeline and browser-only simulator. Armando also co-wrote the TypeScript inverse-kinematics port and the forward-kinematics fix.

Course foundation

The kit supplied CAD models, URDF and STL meshes, an RViz configuration, ROS 2 launch files, and node scaffolds—including direct kinematics—as exercises to complete. These materials belong to RWTH International Academy / IGMR.

The browser simulator makes the mechanism accessible without a local ROS installation. RViz remains the full ROS visualization path.

Collaboration
& attribution

Built with Armando Rodriguez, robotics engineer at Universidad de Monterrey and my teammate on the course, who encouraged the project’s return in 2026.

Robot CAD, URDF, and ROS 2 exercise scaffold: course material of RWTH International Academy gGmbH and IGMR, RWTH Aachen University (all rights reserved), reproduced with attribution for this non-commercial portfolio. Dashboard, simulator, and migration code: MIT. See the project’s NOTICE for provenance and terms.