Introducing DAGSI Whegs™: The latest generation of Whegs™ robots, featuring a passive-compliant body joint

Author

Boxerbaum, Alexander S. ; Oro, Julio ; Quinn, Roger D.

Author_Institution

Case Western Reserve Univ., Cleveland, OH

fYear

2008

fDate

19-23 May 2008

Firstpage

1783

Lastpage

1784

Abstract

DAGSI Whegs is the latest generation of full size Whegs robots. The robot is designed for collaborative work with the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) in SLAM with active feature recognition. Whegs vehicles use abstracted biological principles to navigate over irregular and varied terrain with little or no low level control. Torsionally compliant devices in the drive train of each wheel-leg allow its gait to passively adapt when climbing large obstacles or steep inclines. Whegs is similar to the RHex line of robots that preceded Whegs in that the foot motion of all 6 legs is circular, but it differs in many aspects: 3 leg-spokes versus 1, 1 drive motor vs. 6, leg rotation for steering instead of skid steering, passive gait adaptation vs. active gait control, and Whegs has a body joint.

Keywords

SLAM (robots); collision avoidance; mobile robots; torsion; wheels; DAGSI Whegs robot; SLAM; active feature recognition; active gait control; obstacle climbing; passive gait adaptation; passive-compliant body joint; robot wheel-leg; simultaneous localisation and mapping; torsional compliant device; Foot; Leg; Legged locomotion; Mobile robots; Navigation; Payloads; Robotics and automation; Turning; USA Councils; Vehicles;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Robotics and Automation, 2008. ICRA 2008. IEEE International Conference on

Conference_Location

Pasadena, CA

ISSN

1050-4729

Print_ISBN

978-1-4244-1646-2

Electronic_ISBN

1050-4729

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/ROBOT.2008.4543465

Filename

4543465