Multi-legged robot for rough terrain: SHINAYAKA-L VI

Abstract

There has been an increase in the interest and research on robots that can operate in complex environments. This has led to the use of robots in search and rescue missions and in maintenance and inspection of infrastructures. Various multi-legged robots have been developed with the capability of moving on rough terrain; these can potentially assist “search and rescue” operations following large-scale disasters such as earthquakes. However, it is difficult to control multi-legged robots in real time because large amounts of information must be processed for them to move, involving a considerable computational cost. This is owing to the many independent members of the robot with different degrees of freedom i.e., the body and the legs. We developed a flexible mechanism that passively adapts to complex environments and a robot leg mechanism that switches its stiffness between a hard mode for generating a driving force and a soft mode for passively avoiding obstacles. Further, we developed a prototype robot and conducted experiments; this robot was demonstrated to move on different terrains.