Design and Motion of a Redundant Snake Robot

Abstract

To establish a universal and easily controlled gait for practical use of snake robot movement, inchworm locomotion gait model based on a serpenoid curve is p resented. By analyzing the relations of two adjacent waves in the process of locomotion and doing an approximation of the serpenoid curve, the motion function of relative angles between two adjacent links and the absolute angles between each link and the baseline on the traveling curve are built. Three parameters of the criterions affecting the efficiency of the gait (the number of links that form the traveling wave n, the included angle between two adjacent links ¿, and the phase difference of adjacent included angles ß) are discussed by simulations and experiments. The results show that f is insensitive to n; raising increases dun it significantly; the maximum wave amplitude of ¿ is a decreasing function of n; and increasing ¿ reduces the displacement influence of f when n is determined. The gait model is suitable for different inchworm locomotion's of a snakelike robot whose traveling waves are formed by different numbers of identical links. A wave formed by more links or a greater relative angle between two adjacent links both lead to greater velocity of the movement.