Hybrid Locomotion of Leg-Wheel ASTERISK H

Paper:

Hybrid Locomotion of Leg-Wheel ASTERISK H

Takenobu Yoshioka , Tomohito Takubo , Tatsuo Arai , and Kenji Inoue
 Department
of Systems Innovation, Graduate School of Engineering Science,
Osaka University, 1-3, Machikaneyama, Toyonaka, Osaka 560-8531, Japan
E-mail: yoshioka@arai-lab.sys.es.osaka-u.ac.jp
 Department of Bio-System Engineering, Faculty of Engineering,

Yamagata University, 4-3-16 Jounan, Yonezawa, Yamagata 922-8510, Japan

[Received September 28, 2007; accepted January 24, 2008]

Travelling direction
Leg-wheel hybrid locomotion on rough terrain we
propose for a hexapod robot is realized by continu-
ous transition between wheeled and legged locomotion
based on sensor feedback. In basic positioning on a flat
surface, the robot is supported by three legs and moves
using its wheels. Upon sensing an obstacle, the robot’s
support and swing legs change to a tripod gait with an Rough terrain (1) (2)
oval orbit to cross over the obstacle. The maximum Hit!
obstacle height depends on the robot’s height and the
positioning of the foreleg. We analyzed optimal posi-
tioning implemented in the hybrid robot ASTERISK
H, as confirmed by experimental results.

(3) (4)
Keywords: leg-wheel robot, climbing steps, hexapod
Fig. 1. Concept of our research.
robot, rough terrain

1. Introduction 2. Background

Leg-wheel robots provide the advantage of stable, effi-
cient movement over rough terrain in walking and speed-
ing over flat terrain on wheels. The ASTERISK H hexa-
pod leg-wheel robot we propose (Fig. 1) traverses terrain
with steps where stable movement is possible by walking
but not wheels by alternating rolling and walking based
on sensor feedback. When steps are small enough for
it to roll, it uses its wheels in basic positioning where
3 of 6 legs provide support and the remaining 3 legs
swing. When sensors on support legs detect an obstacle
too large to traverse on wheels, the robot attempts to walk
over the obstacle by switching support and swinging legs.
The maximum obstacle height it manages depends on the
robot’s height and leg positioning. We analyzed optimal
positioning for traversing steps and confirmed its feasibil-
ity with leg-wheel hybrid robot ASTERISK H.
This paper is organized as follows: Section 2 reviews
studies on leg-wheel robots. Section 3 introduces AS-
TERISK H and Section 4 discusses leg and wheel obsta-
cle management. Section 5 details hybrid locomotion and
how the maximum step height is determined by initial leg
positioning. Section 6 summarizes experimental results
and Section 7 presents conclusions.
Leg-wheel robots are roughly divided into those with
active wheels driven by motors and those with passive
wheels but no drive sources. Hirose et al.’s Zero Car-
rier [1], a leg-wheel stair climber, featured active wheels
at the end of 8 legs able to traverse slopes and kept level by
sensors, but its ascent and descent were controlled man-
ually. Miyagi et al.’s leg-wheel chair traversed stairs by
detecting steps with a camera, demonstrating effective au-
tonomous obstacle recognition in travel over rough ter-
rain [2]. The leg-wheel robot Hylos [3] had 4 legs, each
with 2 joints and a wheel with degrees of freedom(DOF)
for steering and driving level over rough terrain. Char-
iotIII [4], developed by Nakajima et al., is a leg-wheel
robot using internal sensor information, including joint
servo angles, for traversing unknown environments.
While active-wheel robots tend to be heavy, passive-
wheel robots feature light weight and simple mechanisms.
Hashimoto et al. proposed movement using passive wheel
friction in their biped WS-3 [5], but it could not switch
from wheels to a biped gait or turn and stop, leaving much
to be desired. Hirose et al. realized pedal walking and
wheel travel in Roller-Walker [6], a passive-wheel robot
with its 4 wheels. Traveling by passive wheels was real-
ized by converting axial friction to rotational force. This
robot switches feet and wheels by rotating its 90Æ around

Journal of Robotics and Mechatronics Vol.20 No.3, 2008 403

Yoshioka, T., et al.
Fig. 2. Leg-wheel type robot “ASTERISK H”.
Table 1. Specifications of ASTERISK H.
Dimensions 815 706 85 mm
Dimensions
(Home Position) 620 537 334 mm
Leg Length 330 mm
Motor Dynamixel DX-117
RS485 :
Signal Communication Max Baud Rate 1Mbps
Weight 3.4 kg
OS NetBSD
Running Speed 30 cm/s
its ankles, indicating that traveling by wheels and gait by
legs are completely separated in the concept.
Adachi et al. developed Walk’n Roll, having both ac-
tive and passive wheels [7] and 2 passive-wheel front legs
with 3 DOF and 2 active-wheel back legs with 1 DOF. The
passive wheels incorporate a lock and the robot moves
in 3 modes based on the environment – wheel, hybrid,
and step. Yoneda et al. proposed semierect movement for
traversing rough terrain by a leg-wheel hybrid quadruped
robot [8] that used instructions from an operator for mov-
ing the center of gravity (COG) when stepping over ob-
jects; it was thus unable to achieve fully autonomous
movement using sensor information.
The complexity of leg-wheel robot mechanics has
caused research to focus on mechanisms and movement
rather than on hybrid leg-wheel locomotion using sensor
information. We propose hybrid rough-terrain locomotion
alternating legs and wheels based on sensor information,
and demonstrate that movement suitable in given environ-
ments can be generated automatically.
3. ASTERISK H
The integrated limb mechanism robot ASTERISK,
having both arm and leg functions [9], moves efficiently
by selecting functions based on the environment and en-
ables components to be downsized through function inte-
gration. Integration involves isotropic leg design for leg
arrangement of the robot. The developed robot, which
404
Joint1 (-75 : +75)
[deg]
Joint4 (-120 : +120)
Joint2
(-95 : +95)
Joint3
(-100 : +100)
Joint1 Joint2 Joint3 Joint4
Wheel
Link1 Link2 Link3 Link4
Body
Side View
Fig. 3. Configuration of joints of ASTERISK H.
has legs in 6 directions disposed radially from the center,
provides working space and traveling capability in all di-
rections. The vertical symmetry of ASTERISK H (Fig. 2,
Table 1) provides equal workability for upper and lower
limbs and its predecessor’s integrated limbs and isotropic
design.
Providing each leg with 4 joints (Fig. 3) enables the
robot to select leg positioning and steering angle for om-
nidirectional movement. Wheels on legs are active and
motor-driven, with encoders on axes providing rotational
information. Servomotors provide torque information.
Combining encoder and torque information enables the
robot to detect the surface on which it moves. Servomo-
tors and sensors are wired and powered by a daisy chain
via RS485 and controlled by a built-in CPU card.
The leg-wheel hybrid locomotion we propose does not
rely on friction, which may vary, but uses sensors to de-
tect load variations in supporting legs encountering steps
and generates gait movement to traverse obstacles. Its tri-
pod gait is typical for hexapod robots, enabling fast, stable
traversal of objects.
4. Leg-Wheel Object Traversal
4.1. Leg Action
Leg robots are statically stable when a vertical line
from the COG goes through the polygon formed by sup-
porting legs. The tripod gait is static, but we evaluated
object traversal using a normalized energy stability mar-
gin [10], which is a robot walking stability index focusing
on mechanical energy and consider movement stability on
rough terrain including steps.
The traversal performance we require is such that it
travels over steps that wheels cannot manage, i.e., steps
higher than the robot’s wheel radius. We confirmed that
ASTERISK H traversed steps over twice the height of the
wheel radius.
4.2. Wheel Action
Under conditions required to traverse a step using a
wheel (Fig. 4) let us use a model in which angle θ formed
Journal of Robotics and Mechatronics Vol.20 No.3, 2008