Posable Hubs For Robotic Platforms

Since early 2018, Tim Hojnik, one of our PhD students has been working on Posable Hubs For Robotic Platforms in a joint collaboration with the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) and his supervisors, Professor Jonathan Roberts (QUT) and Mr Paul Flick (CSIRO).

The goals of this project include:

• Increase traversability of robotic platforms on rough terrain by actively choosing vehicle pose and ride height while maintaining low volumetric profile.
• Provide a locomotion system by converting gravitational potential energy to rotational motion to increase vehicle stability on slopes.
• Increase vehicle ability to dig itself out of bogs in soft terrain by actively changing the centre of rotation of its wheels.

According to Tim, the key benefits of this system are increased traversability of robotic platforms in rough terrains as well as increased chassis stability, which allows carrying of sensitive payloads.

This work has already led to multiple publications and it has a pending patent for a component of this proprietary technology.

• Contactless Position Sensing and Control of Pneumatic Cylinders Using a Hall Effect Sensor Array
• Dynamic Manipulation of Gear Ratio and Ride Height for a Novel Compliant Wheel using Pneumatic Actuators
• Control Comparison and Evaluation of Pneumatic & Electric Linear Actuators for Configurable Center-hub Wheels

The video below shows the wheels demonstrating their radius manipulation capabilities to dynamically choose the chassis pose. A sequence of these body movements can lead to increasing traversability through Centre of Gravity manipulation and ride height adjustment.

 

For more information, contact us.