A tracked robot with novel bio-inspired passive \u201clegs\u201d

Bo Sun,Xingjian Jing

doi:10.1186/s40638-017-0070-6

Bo Sun, Xingjian Jing

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1186/s40638-017-0070-6

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Abstract

For track-based robots, an important aspect is the suppression design, which determines the trafficability and comfort of the whole system. The trafficability limits the robot’s working capability, and the riding comfort limits the robot’s working effectiveness, especially with some sensitive instruments mounted on or operated. To these aims, a track-based robot equipped with a novel passive bio-inspired suspension is designed and studied systematically in this paper. Animal or insects have very special leg or limb structures which are good for motion control and adaptable to different environments. Inspired by this, a new track-based robot is designed with novel “legs” for connecting the loading wheels to the robot body. Each leg is designed with passive structures and can achieve very high loading capacity but low dynamic stiffness such that the robot can move on rough ground similar to a multi-leg animal or insect. Therefore, the trafficability and riding comfort can be significantly improved without losing loading capacity. The new track-based robot can be well applied to various engineering tasks for providing a stable moving platform of high mobility, better trafficability and excellent loading capacity.

Highlights

In the suspension design of track-based robots, including engineering machinery, most methods are motivated by tank suspension design
Note that for a pure spring-mass system, the resonant frequency would be around 15.6 Hz. This greatly validates that the bio-inspired leg can support the same payload but have much smaller dynamic stiffness and much better vibration isolation performance
Properties, which are very good for vibration control of the robot body in a pure passive manner; (2)The bio-inspired structure is successfully applied to the passive suspension design of the track-based mobile robot such that the robot can maintain high stability, trafficability, comfort and loading capacity simultaneously, with only a passive structure design

Summary

Introduction

In the suspension design of track-based robots, including engineering machinery, most methods are motivated by tank suspension design. A novel passive bio-inspired limb-like suspension system is developed in this study, which is completely controlled in a purely passive manner, but can achieve high loading capacity, high stability, high trafficability on tough ground, similar to a multi-leg insects or crabs.

Results

Conclusion