Robohub.org
 

High-speed walkers pretend to go downhill

by
03 February 2011



share this:

The typical way to make a bipedal robot walk is to actuate its leg joints, strap a bunch of sensors to measure its state and add a tight control loop to make sure it is performing the desired steps.

In a radically different approach, passive dynamic walkers can step down slopes without the need for sensing, control or energy. Their driving force comes from gravitation pushing them down the hill. If well designed, and started with adequate initial conditions, the walker will reach a rhythmic and stable walking gait that prevents it from falling on its nose.

Of course, always walking downhill is hardly a viable solution. To make robots walk on level ground, Dong et al. propose to trick the robot into thinking it’s walking on a slope. This is done by extending the back leg of the robot (stance leg) while shortening its front leg (swing leg) before it hits the ground as shown in the figure below (steps I through IV).

The authors propose an analytical model to predict the energy efficiency and speed of the walker based on easy to tune parameters. The result is an energy efficient walker that can move at high speeds. To validate their model, experiments were done on the real walker below. The robot was able to top at a full 1.12 m/s speed, or 4.48leg/s, which is the fastest walking gate demonstrated so far. The leg length was changed by bending and unbending the knee joints.




Sabine Hauert is President of Robohub and Associate Professor at the Bristol Robotics Laboratory
Sabine Hauert is President of Robohub and Associate Professor at the Bristol Robotics Laboratory





Related posts :



Interview with Dautzenberg Roman: #IROS2023 Best Paper Award on Mobile Manipulation sponsored by OMRON Sinic X Corp.

The award-winning author describe their work on an aerial robot which can exert large forces onto walls.
19 November 2023, by

Robot Talk Episode 62 – Jorvon Moss

In the latest episode of the Robot Talk podcast, Claire chatted to Jorvon (Odd-Jayy) Moss from Digikey about making robots at home, and robot design and aesthetics.
17 November 2023, by

California is the robotics capital of the world

In California, robotics technology is a small fish in a much bigger technology pond, and that tends to conceal how important Californian companies are to the robotics revolution.
12 November 2023, by

Robot Talk Episode 61 – Masoumeh Mansouri

In the latest episode of the Robot Talk podcast, Claire chatted to Masoumeh (Iran) Mansouri from the University of Birmingham about culturally sensitive robots and planning in complex environments.
10 November 2023, by

The 5 levels of Sustainable Robotics

Robots can solve the UN SDGs and not just via the application area.
08 November 2023, by

Using language to give robots a better grasp of an open-ended world

By blending 2D images with foundation models to build 3D feature fields, a new MIT method helps robots understand and manipulate nearby objects with open-ended language prompts.
06 November 2023, by





©2021 - ROBOTS Association


 












©2021 - ROBOTS Association