R-Track: Separable Modular Climbing Robot Design for Wall-to-Wall Transition

Abstract

This letter presents the development of a reconfigurable wall-climbing robot (WCR) called R-track. R-Track is designed for operations inside metal structures. It adheres to the metal surface with magnetic tracks. With a modular design which each module of R-Track can be connected or disconnected without an additional actuator, R-Track can perform various wall-to-wall transitions. In particular, external wall transitions that have been difficult for previous WCRs can be achieved by R-track with a cooperation between modules. The statics of R-Track during wall transitions was analyzed to identify and verify an appropriate reconfiguration strategy. Experiments on wall-to-wall transitions were conducted to demonstrate the performance of R-Track. The results indicate that R-Track successfully performed all kinds of perpendicular wall-to-wall transitions.