Finite Element Analysis Within Component Design Process of Hydraulic Quadruped Robot

Abstract

The lightweight constructions and components stiffness play an important role in mechanics and in particular in high performance robots. In this paper the Virtual Prototyping Design (VPD) approach for addressing the robot design to this goal is shown. The VPD is applied to three mechanical problems of Walking Hydraulic Robots (WHRs): the first one deals with the leg joint sensitivity analysis; the second one concerns a force sensor optimization while the third one presents the torso structural verification. In all the aforementioned studies the experimental tests and the fitting analyses for model validation were carried out reaching satisfactory results.