Abstract
Biped climbing robots (BiCRs) can overcome obstacles and perform transition easily thanks to their superior flexibility. However, to move in a complex truss environment, grips from the original point to the destination, as a sequence of anchor points along the route, are indispensable. In this paper, a grip planning method is presented for BiCRs generating optimal collision-free grip sequences, as a continuation of our previous work on global path planning. A mathematic model is firstly built up for computing the operational regions for negotiating obstacle members. Then a grip optimization model is proposed to determine the grips within each operational region for transition or for obstacle negotiation. This model ensures the total number of required climbing steps is minimized and the transition grips are with good manipulability. Lastly, the entire grip sequence satisfying the robot kinematic constraint is generated by a gait interpreter. Simulations are conducted with our self-developed biped climbing robot (Climbot), to verify the effectiveness and efficiency of the proposed methodology.
Highlights
Spatial trusses consisting of members are widely used in the construction of roofs, towers, bridges, and the like
Further to our previous work, we present an optimal collision-free grip planning method to minimize the number of climbing steps in this paper
If collision avoidance is not taken into account, we do not need to compute the operational regions for negotiating obstacles prior to grip planning
Summary
Spatial trusses consisting of members are widely used in the construction of roofs, towers, bridges, and the like. They focused on how to stride across one obstacle only, but not generating the nearby footprint sequences Please note that these footstep planning methods for humanoid robots are always applied in 2D or 2.5D environments, which differs from the grip planning for BiCRs in complex 3D truss environments. Lam et al [7] discretized the tree surface into finite grasp points, used a dynamic programming algorithm to identify the global path and adopted a motion planning algorithm to generate the single-step climbing motion This method was only applicable to BiCRs climbing on the object surface with non-enclosure grippers. The novelty of this paper is the first systematic presentation of an optimal collision-free grip planner for the biped climbing robots generating grip sequences in a complex truss environment.
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