Clothbot: Hardware improvement and auto-control

Clothbot is a new kind of climbing robot with novel structure that enables it to move on human cloth. Earlier version of Clothbot can only climb on cloth with manual control because there is complex deformation on human cloth and thus Clothbot can´t keep itself stable. In this paper, we propose some new hardware improvements to enhance the stability of Clothbot on human cloth, then adopt a remote control system that enables Clothbot climbing automatically. To ensure that proper amount of cloth is gripped between two wheels, we add a shield in the front to prevent Clothbot from suck superfluous cloth and adjust its pose to prevent it from slipping off. A balance tail in the end makes Clothbot free from side tumbling. Based on these hardware improvement, Clothbot can move steadily on human body and auto control strategy becomes applicable. The whole climbing process is divide into discrete steps and A* is repeatedly called to compute path at the beginning of each step. Experiments have been conduct to test the effect of hardware change and it shows that Clothbot can automatically climb on human body.