5 accepted papers
Sandy environments present challenges for robotic space rovers and systems due to reduced traction, limiting mobility and tugging force. This paper presents an anchoring method that utilizes a winching system to create a sand mound in front of a mobile agent dragged through the media. The proposed c
We develop a new resistive force theory based granular limit surface (RFT-GLS) method to predict and guide behaviors of forceful ground robots. As a case study, we harness a small mobile robotic system – MiniRQuad (296 g) – to ‘walk-burrow-tug;’ it actively exploits ground anchoring by burrowing its
With the current trend of dwindling life cycle of production, necessity of systems with high-adaptability is on the rise. With their high adaptability and easy maintenance, reconfigurable manipulators are strong candidates to replace conventional non-reconfigurable manipulators in such trend. Howeve
This work presents a novel spherical tensegrity robot, T12-R, which is designed and prototyped based on a twelve-rod tensegrity structure that resembles a rhombicuboctahedron. The geometry of T12-R allows for fast rolling and a detailed description of the robot design is provided. A simulation study…
Robots based on tensegrity structures have the potential to be robust, efficient and adaptable. While traditionally being difficult to control, recent control strategies for ball-shaped tensegrity robots have successfully enabled punctuated rolling, hill-climbing and obstacle climbing. These gains h…