Basin of Attraction of the Simplest Walking Model

Abstract Passive dynamic walking is an important development for walking robots, supplying natural, energy-efficient motions. In practice, the cyclic gait of passive dynamic prototypes appears to be stable, only for small disturbances. Therefore, in this paper we research the basin of attraction of the cyclic walking motion for the simplest walking model. Furthermore, we present a general method for deriving the equations of motion and impact equations for the analysis of multibody systems, as in walking models. Application of the cell mapping method shows the basin of attraction to be a small, thin area. It is shown that the basin of attraction is not directly related to the stability of the cyclic motion.