Study on Roller-Walk (basic characteristics and its control)

A new leg-wheel hybrid vehicle named "Roller-Walker" is proposed. The Roller-Walker is a vehicle with special foot mechanism which changes to the sole for walking mode and passive wheels for wheel mode. On rugged terrain the vehicle walks in the leg mode, and on level or comparatively smooth terrain the vehicle makes wheeled locomotion by using the passive wheel in the way of roller-skating. The characteristics of the Roller-Walker are: (1) it has lightweight body and hybrid function; (2) it has potential capability to exhibit high terrain adaptability in the wheeled mode if the control method of the Roller-Walking is fully investigated in the future. The paper makes basic simulation experiments and demonstrates basic relations on the terrain adaptive trajectory control method of the Roller-Walk.