Development of a wall climbing robot with wheel-leg hybrid locomotion mechanism

A novel prototype of self-contained wall-climbing robot used for special tasks such as rescue, inspection, surveillance and reconnaissance is developed. The wheel-leg hybrid locomotion mechanism enable the robot to achieve quick motion on wall surface, as well as obstacle- spanning on wall surfaces and smooth wall-to-wall transitions. The robot is composed of a base body and a mechanical leg with 3 DOF. The base body is a big flat suction cup with three-wheeled locomotion mechanism inside, and there is a small flat sucker in the end of the mechanical leg. The new designed chamber seal has simple structure and has steady and reliable performance. A distributed embedded control system is also described which enable the robot operating manually and semi-autonomously in wheeled motion mode or legged motion mode. Kinematics model of the robot is established to analyze the robot´s motion on the wall. And the locomotion gait of the robot is discussed. Safety analysis of the robot on vertical surfaces shows the robot´s reliable adhesion ability to working on wall surfaces.