Modeling, Simulation and Implementation of Locomotion Patterns for Hexapod Robots

摘要

The legged robots can insert themselves in environments for which the robots with wheels are simply incapable of be inserted, as is the case of obstacles of large dimensions, terrain loose or steep slopes [1]- [5]. The objective of this work is to develop the modeling of hexapods robots and simulate them in a virtual environment of mechanical systems (according to Fig. 1), which makes possible performance analysis of several model criteria and determine the virtual path built by the robot [6]. The present work implemented the robot simulation in the Simulink simulation environment, using SimMechanics [7]. A computer program [8] was developed to make changes in the mechanical structure, in the simulation parameters, to evaluate the stability of the type of locomotion, the direct visualization of the position, speed, acceleration, and force applied to each foot of the robot. With the implementation of the stability determination algorithm, it was possible to verify that, for different locomotion patterns, there was an improvement in the stability, starting from the metachronal wave to tetrapod and tripod gaits, and there was also a consecutive decrease in the minimum torque required to the servo motors [9].