Bionic design and anti-slip characteristics study of quadruped robot foot

Abstract

Quadruped robot has been widely used in the field of national defense because of its high adaptability. The stability and balance capacity is the important performances needed during the quadruped robot moving under uneven terrains, and the slip resistance of the foot affects the balance performance of robot. As the goat hoof with irregular surface morphology adapts to rugged terrain, its plantar geometric shape was reconstructed using reverse engineering technology based on the point clouds which were obtained by using a 3D hand laser scanner. The bionic foot was designed based on goat hoof plantar surface, and the anti-slip characteristics were analyzed by finite element method, and then compared with the spherical foot and cylindrical foot. The frictions between these feet and soils or rocks at different pressures were investigated, and the result shows that the maximum static frictions between bionic and soil and rock are greater than that of the two others, which means bionic foot has better anti-slip performance.