[myself248]

There's no IK because sometimes the operator needs to be very specific about where the "elbow" or "shoulder" ends up, to avoid hitting some other object. So they have manual control over everything.

If you're going to automate the kinematics, then you either need a manual override mode (which the operators will be unskilled with since it's seldom-used), or you need sensors and rules for the machine to know where it's not supposed to be (clearances around wires, other structures, etc) and that needs to be better than human operators currently do.

Those are theoretically possible, sure, but a valve-per-cylinder is really stinkin' reliable.