Design and Optimization of an Omnidirectional Permanent-Magnetic Wheeled Wall-Climbing Microrobot with MEMS-Based Electromagnetic Micromotors

Abstract

The paper presents a compact omnidirectional permanent-magnetic wheeled wall-climbing microrobot. A millimeter-sized axial flux electromagnetic micromotor based on MEMS technology has been specially fabricated for the microrobot and its size is 6.8 mm × 7.8 mm × 3.9 mm. A novel permanent-magnetic wheel is designed, which is directly integrated with the stators and rotor of the electromagnetic micromotor. The omnidirectional wall-climbing mechanism is realized by a set of steering gears and three standard permanent-magnetic wheels. By static and dynamic force analysis of the microrobot, the required magnetic force and the required torques for its translational and steering movements are derived. To reduce the unnecessary torque consumption of the microrobot, its structural parameters are optimized in combination with its design constraints by ANSOFT and Pro/Engineer simulation. A prototype of the proposed microrobot with the maximum designed load capacity of 3 g is developed, whose size is 26 mm in diameter and 16.4 mm in height. Experimental and simulation results demonstrate the feasibility of these concepts.