| Budget Amount *help |
¥2,300,000 (Direct Cost: ¥2,300,000)
Fiscal Year 1994: ¥1,000,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,000,000)
Fiscal Year 1993: ¥1,300,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,300,000)
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| Research Abstract |
Although wheels are very efficient on flat and tight terrain locomotion, they cannot climb up stairs or even a step. Stairs or a step are the most popular obstacles in outside applications of mobile robots especially in artificial environments.
The author have already provided a new wheel-feet hybrid mechanism, named as Enhanced Wheel System (EWS), for rough terrain locomotion especially for climbing up stairs or a step. To climb up stairs or a step by the EWS,several 'feet'combined on each wheel (named as 'wheel-feet') are kept always horizontal by parallel link mechanisms controlled by the servo-mechanism. A prototype mechine with the EWS has been made and the author shows that the prototype is able to rum smoothly on flat terrain by wheels and climb up stairs using those 'feet'.
In this research, a new prototype machine (EWS-4) with a carrier has been made to certify that the EWS can be used in actual use carrying about 100kg payload on a carrier. EWS-4 has4'wheel-feet'with4'feet'in each'wheel-feet', and 4 wheels to run. The specifications of EWS-4 is 1600mm long, 980mm wide, 950mm high, 1000mm wheel base, 600mm trad and about 200kg weight. Both wheels and'wheel-feet'are driven by 2 of 300W AC-servo-motors under rotation speed control and torque control by the on-board computer and servo-drivers. And one 55W DC-servo-motor is also used for leveling control ofL'feet'and the carrier.The EWS-4 was designed to run not only AC line supply but DC batteries. Four ultra-sonic sensors are used for the cooperative control of wheels and 'wheel-feet'while climbing up and down stairs automatically. Experiments to climb up and down stairs, 150mm high and 350mm deep, were held carrying 60kg operator and control units. The EWS-4 could climb up and down stairs without slipping.
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