Dynamics-based control of a one-legged hopping robot

Abstract

This paper proposes a new model of a one-legged hopping robot. The one-legged hopping robot is useful in realizing rapid movement such as that of a running animal. Although it has a simple leg mechanism, the dynamics are not simple and require non-linear complex analysis. This means that it is not easy to derive a controller for stable hopping in a systematic way. Therefore, a dynamics-based approach was introduced where the controller is empirically derived based on characteristic dynamics. A prototype of the one-legged hopping robot was fabricated and a precise simulator of the robot, including actuator dynamics, was constructed to examine the usefulness of the proposed dynamics model. Applying the constructed simulator to the prototype, the robot succeeded in planar one-legged hopping.