Robot evaluation and selection Part B: a comparative analysis

Robot selection is a challenging process for most industrial production purposes. The variability of characteristics and the capabilities of robotic mechanisms, which determine their specialization in specific tasks, render the selection procedure even more complicated. Various methodologies and, by extension, different perspectives have been introduced in order to address the selection problem using several decision-making tools. In the current article, an integrated comparative analysis of a representative sample of methodologies, which have been implemented for two real-world problems, is presented. Additionally, a generator of random example cases in conjunction with correlation (Spearman’s rank correlation coefficients) and visual (dendrograms and bar graphs) tools has been used in order to detect similarities and differences between the selection methods as well as to evaluate qualitatively their overall behavior.