Achievement of Aerial Object Transportation and Manipulation by a Flying Humanoid Robot with Bi-rotor Flight Unit

Abstract

This paper proposes a flying humanoid robot with a bi-rotor flight unit. While walking is a common method of movement for humanoid robots, it is not always sufficient for certain tasks. To enhance mobility, we apply aerial robotics to create a flying humanoid robot that can walk and fly. We focus on using bi-rotor configuration for the flight unit due to its capability to change the position of the center of gravity. We describe the modeling and control of the bi-rotor and present a method for generating takeoff poses. Additionally, we demonstrate the hardware implementations of the bi-rotor flight unit, humanoid robot, and entire embedded software system. Finally, we perform several experiments to verify the feasibility of flight control, extended mobility, and aerial manipulation and transportation.