franka_ros2

Note

franka_ros2 is not supported on Windows.

The franka_ros2 repo contains a ROS 2 integration of libfranka.

Caution

franka_ros2 is currently beta software, so be careful while using it and report bugs on GitHub.

Prerequisites

sudo apt install -y libpoco-dev libeigen3-dev
git clone https://github.com/frankaemika/libfranka.git --recursive
cd libfranka
mkdir build && cd build
cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DBUILD_TESTS=OFF  ..
cmake --build . -j$(nproc)
cpack -G DEB
sudo dpkg -i libfranka-*.deb

Optional .bashrc Settings

  • To get colorized warn and error messages you can put export RCUTILS_COLORIZED_OUTPUT=1 into your .bashrc.

  • If your system language is not set to American English you should put export LC_NUMERIC=en_US.UTF-8 into your .bashrc to avoid issues in RViz.

Setup

  1. Install requirements:

    sudo apt install -y \
ros-foxy-control-msgs \
ros-foxy-xacro \
ros-foxy-angles \
ros-foxy-ros2-control \
ros-foxy-realtime-tools \
ros-foxy-control-toolbox \
ros-foxy-moveit \
ros-foxy-ros2-controllers \
ros-foxy-joint-state-publisher \
ros-foxy-joint-state-publisher-gui \
ros-foxy-ament-cmake-clang-format \
python3-colcon-common-extensions

  2. Create a ROS 2 workspace:

    mkdir -p ~/franka_ros2_ws/src

  3. Clone repo and build packages:

    source /opt/ros/foxy/setup.bash
cd ~/franka_ros2_ws
git clone https://github.com/frankaemika/franka_ros2.git src/franka_ros2
colcon build --cmake-args -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release
source install/setup.sh

MoveIt

To see if everything works, you can try to run the MoveIt example on the robot:

ros2 launch franka_moveit_config moveit.launch.py robot_ip:=<fci-ip>

Then activate the MotionPlanning display in RViz.

If you do not have a robot you can still test your setup by running on a dummy hardware:

ros2 launch franka_moveit_config moveit.launch.py robot_ip:=dont-care use_fake_hardware:=true

Wait until you can see the green You can start planning now! message from MoveIt inside the terminal. Then turn off the PlanningScene and turn it on again. After that turn on the MotionPlanning.

Example Controllers

This repo comes with a few example controllers located in the franka_example_controllers package.

The following launch files are executed with the gripper by default. If you do not have the gripper attached you can disable the gripper in the launch file with load_gripper:=false.

Move-to-start

This controller moves the robot to its home configuration.

ros2 launch franka_bringup move_to_start_example_controller.launch.py robot_ip:=<fci-ip>

Gravity Compensation

This is the simplest controller that we have and is a good starting point to write your own. It sends zero as torque command to all joints, which means that the robot only compensates its own weight.

ros2 launch franka_bringup gravity_compensation_example_controller.launch.py robot_ip:=<fci-ip>

Joint Impedance Example

The example moves joints 4 and 5 in a periodic movement that is very compliant. You can try to move the joints while it is running.

ros2 launch franka_bringup joint_impedance_example_controller.launch.py robot_ip:=<fci-ip>

Package Descriptions

This section contains more detailed descriptions of what each package does. In general the package structure tries to adhere to the structure that is proposed here.

franka_bringup

This package contains the launch files for the examples as well as the basic franka.launch.py launch file, that can be used to start the robot without any controllers.

When you start the robot with:

ros2 launch franka_bringup franka.launch.py robot_ip:=<fci-ip> use_rviz:=true

There is no controller running apart from the joint_state_broadcaster. However, a connection with the robot is still established and the current robot pose is visualized in RViz. In this mode the robot can be guided when the user stop button is pressed. However, once a controller that uses the effort_command_interface is started, the robot will be using the torque interface from libfranka. For example it is possible to launch the gravity_compensation_example_controller by running:

ros2 control load_controller --set-state start  gravity_compensation_example_controller

This is the equivalent of running the gravity_compensation_example_controller.launch.py launch file mentioned in Gravity Compensation.

When the controller is stopped with:

ros2 control set_controller_state gravity_compensation_example_controller stop

the robot will stop the torque control and will only send its current state over the FCI.

You can now choose to start the same controller again with:

ros2 control set_controller_state gravity_compensation_example_controller start

or load and start a different one:

ros2 control load_controller --set-state start joint_impedance_example_controller

Note

When the robot stops due to an error, the ros2_control_node dies. This will shutdown all other nodes as well. To recover from this, you have to toggle the user stop button before you can restart the launch file.

franka_description

This package contains the xacro files and meshes that are used to visualize the robot. Further, it contains a launch file that visualizes the robot model without access to a real robot:

ros2 launch franka_description visualize_franka.launch.py load_gripper:=<true|false>

franka_example_controllers

This package contains a few controllers that can be seen as example of how to write controllers in ROS 2. Currently, a controller only has access to measured joint positions and joint velocities. Based on this information the controller can send torque commands. It is currently not possible to use other interfaces like the joint position interface.

Important

In contrast to franka_ros, it is currently not possible to directly access properties like the mass matrix, coriolis torques or jacobians.

franka_gripper

This package contains the franka_gripper_node for interfacing with the Franka Hand.

The franka_gripper_node provides the following actions:

  • homing - homes the gripper and updates the maximum width given the mounted fingers.

  • move - moves to a target width with the defined speed.

  • grasp - tries to grasp at the desired width with the desired force while closing with the given speed. The operation is successful if the distance d between the gripper fingers is width - epsilon.inner < d < width + epsilon.outer

  • gripper_action - a special grasping action for MoveIt.

Also, there is a stop service that aborts gripper actions and stops grasping.

Use the following launch file to start the gripper:

ros2 launch franka_gripper gripper.launch.py robot_ip:=<fci-ip>

In a different tab you can now perform the homing and send a grasp command.

ros2 action send_goal /panda_gripper/homing franka_msgs/action/Homing {}
ros2 action send_goal -f /panda_gripper/grasp franka_msgs/action/Grasp "{width: 0.00, speed: 0.03, force: 50}"

The inner and outer epsilon are 0.005 meter per default. You can also explicitly set the epsilon:

ros2 action send_goal -f /panda_gripper/grasp franka_msgs/action/Grasp "{width: 0.00, speed: 0.03, force: 50, epsilon: {inner: 0.01, outer: 0.01}}"

To stop the grasping, you can use stop service.

ros2 service call /panda_gripper/stop std_srvs/srv/Trigger {}

franka_hardware

This package contains the franka_hardware plugin needed for ros2_control. The plugin is loaded from the URDF of the robot and passed to the controller manger via the robot description. It provides for each joint:

  • a position state interface that contains the measured joint position.

  • a velocity state interface that contains the measured joint velocity.

  • an effort state interface that contains the measured link-side joint torques including gravity.

  • an effort command interface that contains the desired joint torques without gravity.

The IP of the robot is read over a parameter from the URDF.

franka_moveit_config

This package contains the configuration for MoveIt2. There is a new move group called panda_manipulator that has its tip between the fingers of the gripper and has its Z-axis rotated by -45 degrees, so that the X-axis is now facing forward, making it easier to use. The panda_arm move group is still available for backward compatibility. New applications should use the new panda_manipulator move group instead.

_images/move-groups.png

Visualization of the old and the new move group

franka_msgs

This package contains the definitions for the different gripper actions.

Important

In contrast to franka_ros, there is no longer a FrankaState message, as there is currently no way to communicate it from the hardware class.

joint_effort_trajectory_controller

This package contains a modified joint_trajectory_controller that can use the effort interface of the franka_hardware::FrankaHardwareInterface. It is based on this Pull request and backported to Foxy. It offers a FollowJointTrajectory action that is needed for MoveIt.

Differences between franka_ros and franka_ros2

This section gives an overview of the fundamental changes between franka_ros and franka_ros2.

franka_gripper

  • All topics and actions were previously prefixed with franka_gripper. This prefix was renamed to panda_gripper to enable, in the future, a workflow where all prefixes are based on the arm_id to effortlessly enable multi arm setups.

  • The stop action is now a service action as it is not preemptable.

  • All actions (apart from the gripper_action) have the current gripper width as feedback.

franka_gazebo

Currently, we do not offer a Gazebo integration with franka_ros2. However, we provide one with franka_ros.

franka_visualization

This package does not exist anymore. However, franka_description provides a launch file to visualize the robot model without a connection to a robot.

franka_control

This package does not exist anymore. The connection to the robot is provided by the hardware plugin in the franka_hardware package. The actions and services that it provided are currently not offered in franka_ros2.

Writing Controllers

Compared to franka_ros we currently offer a reduced set of controller interfaces:

  • Joint positions

  • Joint velocities

  • Measured torques

The reason is that the hardware interface currently only supports double data types, making it impossible to expose e.g. a franka::RobotState.

You can base your own controller on one of the franka_example_controllers. To compute kinematic and dynamic quantities of the robot you can use the joint states and the URDF of the robot in libraries like KDL (of which there is also a ROS 2 package available).

Known Issues

  • When using the fake_hardware with MoveIt, it takes some time until the default position is applied.