Design, Development, and Motion Analysis of Robotic Arm for Rover Rescue from Sand Traps

Abstract

The construction of lunar infrastructure is crucial for future human activities. Unmanned vehicles, such as rovers, serve as key mobility systems for construction tasks but face the risk of becoming trapped by sand and immobilized on uneven terrains. This paper focuses on a scenario where a rover being stuck is rescued by another rover via a robotic manipulator. We design and prototype a two-link robotic manipulator and conduct dynamic simulation along with experimental demonstrations. The experimental result are generally consistent with simulation results, particularly in terms of identifying the energy-efficient configurations of the manipulator for effective rescue operations.