Omnidirectional Static Walking of a Quadruped Robot on a Slope

Paper:

Omnidirectional Static Walking of a Quadruped Robot on a Slope

Lei Zhang, Shugen Ma , Yoshinori Honda , and Kousuke Inoue
Department of

Systems Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Ibaraki University 4-12-1 Nakanarusawa-Cho, Hitachi-Shi 316-8511, Japan E-mail: shugen@dse.ibaraki.ac.jp, zhang@roboken.dse.ibaraki.ac.jp COE Research Institute, Ritsumeikan University 1-1-1 Noji Higashi, Kusatsu-Shi 525-8577, Japan Computron Corporation 1-11-2 Tonnya-Cho, Maebashi-Shi 371-0855, Japan [Received May 17, 2005; accepted July 25, 2005]

We propose successive gait transition with arbitrary body posture to enable a quadruped robot to walk statically and omnidirectionally on a slope. Body posture is determined by rotation around 3 axes, roll, pitch, and yaw. Successive gait transition with a minimum number of steps on a slope is realizable using common foot position before and after gait transition. The time required to transit between gaits is reduced by carefully designing foot position in crawling and rotating while limiting foot reachable region on a slope. The robot thus walks into any direction with arbitrary body postures. In this study, we also verify a tradeoff relation between motion speed and body posture. Computer simulation and experiments veried the feasibility of our proposed method and the stability of gait transition based on static stability margin.

Keywords: quadruped robot, omnidirectional walking, body posture, successive gait transition, walking on a slope

1 . Introduction
Quadruped robots have advantages over wheeled robots in their ability to walk on irregular terrain in any direction. Researches on quadruped robots have been widely carried out [13]. Fukuoka et al. also realized dynamic walking of a quadruped robot on irregular terrain using a neural system method [4]. Since stability is more important than speed in conveyance tasks, we focused on static walking for its stability. To increase stability, Tsukakoshi et al. proposed an intermittent crawl gait [5]. More recently, Konno et al. presented an adaptive intermittent crawl gait [6]. Since the zigzag trajectory or 4-leg support period used by a quadruped robot on a slope, its movement is generally slow. Semiautonomous walking based on leg transition at the perimeter of leg movement has been proposed [7], and gait transitions forward and backward, turning left and right, and rotation have been Journal of Robotics and Mechatronics Vol.18 No.1, 2006

discussed in cooperative sideway movement [8], but omnidirectional static walking with arbitrary body posture on a slope has not progressed as far as other types. We discussed successive gait transition [9] for a quadruped robot to walk omnidirectionally and statically on a horizontal plane using crawl and rotation gaits. It transited between gaits successively, stably, and continuously with the least number of steps using the common foot position (CFP), a leg position common to two gaits before and after gait transition. Gait transition chooses the crawl or rotation from the turning center and transfers from one gait to another continuously when changing the turning center. The applicable environment was restricted to a horizontal plane, however, making it difcult for the quadruped robot to adapt well to different environments. We have considered expanding omnidirectional static walking to a slope [10], keeping the robot horizontal for conveyance tasks. But in such a case, there will occur a problem that the leg reachable region becomes narrow and motion speed becomes slow. To improve motion speed of robot, we considered body posture with the largest leg reachable region, i.e., parallel to the slope, although this required shifting the CFP for successive gait transition. Leg reachable region also becomes narrow, slowing the robot. So we considered the relationship between motion speed and body posture, determining what would enable the fastest motion speed on a slope. In this paper, we propose integrating (1) static walking with high environmental adaptability, (2) omnidirectional movement, and (3) high motion speed. Section 2 discusses how to realizing omnidirectional static walking on a slope using specied body posture. Section 3 details successive gait transition on a slope with this body posture, so that the robot moves into all direction with a minimum number of steps through CFP design. Section 4 explains computer simulation and experiments demonstrating the feasibility of our proposed method and results, clarifying the tradeoff between motion speed and body posture.

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bR

Z
bP

bY
G

COG G

Y
G , G
Vertical projection of COG

Hcog (height of COG)

X X
G , G

Y
Fig. 3. Coordinates , and . Fig. 1. Quadruped robot TITAN-VIII.
Y
Approximated leg movement area

Y X X

Y X

Z
Leg reachable region Ri

Z
Slope

X-Crawl

leg 3 leg 4

c3 c4

Y
leg 2

Ri
Y Y-Crawl X Y X Y X

leg 1

c2

Ri

c1
(a) Robot model

Approximated leg movement area Ai (b) Leg movement area Ai and reachable region Ri on a slope

Y Rotation X

Y X

Y X

Fig. 2. Robot model, leg movement area A i and reachable region Ri .

CFP: leg placement common to two gaits before and after gaittransition

2 . Omnidirectional Static Walking on a Slope

The quadruped robot we used was TITAN-VIII (Fig.1) [11], assuming mechanical leg movement area Ai to be an octahedron centering on the CFP ci for standard posture on a horizontal plane (Fig.2). The basal plane of A i is a rectangle. The height from ci to the vertex of Ai in positive and negative directions was made the same as the mechanical movement limit for the legs. Leg reachable region Ri on a slope is a polygon resulting from the intersection of leg movement area Ai and the slope. This can be formulated easily and enables gait planning in real time. Our proposed method is, of course, applicable to any leg movement area.

Fig. 4. CFP for each gait on a slope.

plane and its X -axis is in the direction of the orthogonal projection of the X -axis to the horizontal plane. Slope coordinate : Origin G is common to G . The directions of s axes result from rotating around Y axis at angle and around Z -axis at angle bY . Each rotating matrix is set to Ej and EkbY . Homogeneous transformation matrices between coordinates are described as

T T T

EjbP EibR 0 0 0 Ej EkbY 0 0 0 T T

EjbP EibR p 1 0 1

. . . .

(1)

2.1. Coordinates In considering omnidirectional static walking of a quadruped robot on a slope, we set the right-hand coordinates shown in Fig.3. We assume the slope with xed inclination angle as the known parameter and the height from the center of gravity (COG) to the slope as a xed value, h. Body posture is determined by rotations around 3 axes of body coordinate, roll, pitch and yaw, ( bR , bP , bY ). Body coordinate : Origin G is located at the COG, its X -axis is at the front of the robot, its Y -axis is in the left direction and Z -axis is at the top. Horizontal plane coordinate : Origin G is an intersection of the gravity direction from the COG and the slope that results from oblique parallel projection from G to the slope. Its Z -axis is normal to the horizontal
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. . . . . . . .

(2) (3)

. . . . . . . . . . . .

0 0 h ) is the vector from the oriwhere p (p gin of to that of . Rotating matrix EjbP EibR results after rotating around Y -axis at angle bP and around X -axis at angle bR . Gaits are rst planned on slope coordinate , then transformed to those on body coordinate , to control the robot.

2.2. Common Foot Position (CFP) on a Slope To minimize steps in gait transition among crawl and rotation gaits, foot trajectories before and after gait transition use the CFP shown in Fig.4 [9]. Setting this
Journal of Robotics and Mechatronics Vol.18 No.1, 2006