AIDING THE OPERATOR IN THE MANUAL CONTROL OF A SPACE MANIPULATOR

When an operator has to control a space manipulator manually he is fac ed with several difficulties. Three problems were investigated: Lack o f direct vision, up to 6 degrees-of-freedom (DOF) to be controlled, an d slow and complex dynamics. The results showed that reference lines e nhance the 3D perception; further automation of the insert task led to a more efficient task execution; the display of the stopping configur ation can lead to less energy consumption due to more calm control beh aviour. The length of the prediction horizon should equal half of the stopping time.