Planar locomotion of a vibration-driven system with two internal masses

Abstract

A vibration-driven system is modelled to achieve the expected planar locomotion in the present paper. The system is composed of a main rigid body and two internal and movable masses. Coulomb dry friction and nonholonomic constraint of the body are considered to model stick-slip effect and to ensure the motion without sideslip. It is seen that driving periodically the two masses in two orthogonal directions leads to the expected planar locomotion. Correspondingly, the translational and rotary velocities of the system are analytically obtained. As a result, the system can move not only along oblique line in any given slope but also along folding lines derived from the oblique lines in the different slopes.