Optimal Design And Experiment Verification Of A Novel Wheel-legged Mobile Robot

As an important part of the robotic family,mobile robots have been well recognized because of their capability to work under severe conditions or explore unknown environment such as earthquake,nuclear radiation and fire.Focusing on the ability of obstacle surmounting in hazardous areas,this paper proposes a novel wheel-legged mobile robot combining latest developments in mobile robots and mechanisms.Corresponding research work involves structural design,parameter optimization,gait planning,control system,prototype development and experimental validation.Details can be concluded as follow.1.Aiming at developing mobile robots qualified for dangerous circumstance,a novel wheel-legged mobile robot is invented,which has the advantage of simple structure,good obstacle performance,high speed and fine stability.2.By simulating the obstacles with staircase,the stair-climbing capability of the wheel-legged mobile robots is analyzed.The relationship between number of spokes and stair-climbing capability is firstly investigated resorting to the static mechanics.And then the highly efficient stair-climbing strategy is developed by geometrical approach on the basis of characterized staircase.Finally,parameters of the wheeled legs are optimized in terms of chord length and radius of curvature.3.Synchronous and diagonal gait analysis of the wheel-legged mobile robot is carried out for the consideration of both efficient obstacle climbing and high moving speed.And the corresponding kinematic analysis is implemented.The requirements for speed and gait type are obtained by discussing the static stability of synchronous gait and dynamic stability of diagonal gait.4.The effect of wheeled legs to the stability of mobile robot is examined and the optimization of the flexible parameters is conducted by Design Expert and ADAMS.The effectiveness of the designed structure and planned gait is proved by simulation,and the stair-climbing capability of the wheel-legged mobile robots is confirmed.5.By means of the optimized parameters and functionality of the wheel-legged mobile robot,software and hardware designs are proposed.PC operation module based on Labview and mobile operation module based on Android are developed for adjustability and convenience of the manipulation process.6.The prototype of the wheeled-legged mobile robot is established and the control system is accomplished.Experiments on flat pavement,gravel road,abrupt slope and staircase are carried out,which verify the good obstacle crossing capability and stability of the wheeled-legged mobile robot,moreover,the effectiveness of the proposed analyzing methods.