Novel hybrid ground/aerial autonomous robot

Abstract

This paper presents a novel robot that combines flying and ground moving capabilities. In doing so, new applications areas for robotics are created in which these two capabilities are needed to perform the tasks. The flying motion will be based on the concept of flying mechanism of the quadrotor. Wheeled mobile platform is combined to the flying mechanism to facilitate ground motion. Transformation mechanism was developed to transform the robot from the ground motion configuration to the flying motion configuration and vice versa. The idea of this mechanism is to close the rotors' arms of the quadrotor and put them in the vertical position when the robot is used for ground motion. This is necessary to enable navigation through narrow spaces. A manipulator with 3-DOF has been added to handle objects during ground motion. After defining the appropriate mechanisms and the basic structure of the robot, geometrical dimensions and material selection of each part are decided. Then, CAD model is developed using SolidWorks, and an iterative process has been carried out to enhance and develop the robot structure and the transformation mechanism. The CAD model was tested using the finite element method in ANSYS14 where static structural study is performed. Finally, motors, sensors and control system hardware were selected for this robot. The analysis indicates the feasibility of the proposed robot.