Reconfiguration of a Group of Wheel-Manipulator Robots Based on MSV and CSM

The problem addressed in this paper is the representation and reconfiguration of the group configurations assembled by wheel-manipulator robots. The wheel-manipulator robot as a module, which can independently perform the actions of locomotion and manipulation, possesses the properties of the postural orientation and the locomotive direction. The group configurations of these robots can be reconfigured through changing the connection between them. The aim of the reconfiguration is to generate better configurations adapting to the environment. The module state vector is proposed to represent the state of the asymmetric robotic module while the configuration state matrix is introduced to represent the group configuration of these robots. This approach supports transformation operation for triggering the elementary motions of the robot and reconfiguration between group configurations. The algorithms are proposed for assembling optimally the configuration of individual modules and for transforming optimally the configurations of the robots. Their validity is evaluated and demonstrated through numerical simulations.