Abstract
It is empirically understood that McKibben pneumatic actuators have various positive characteristics, and research done on the modeling of McKibben pneumatic actuators has been well conducted. However, although the modeling research was achieved relatively well, the subjects of what features of the actuator are important, and how the features influence stable robot motion, have not yet to be adequately discussed. Thus, in many cases, McKibben pneumatic actuators were designed and controlled are based upon rule-of-thumb. Then, the purpose of our research is to analyze how various characteristics of the actuator influence the stability of the movement generated by the McKibben pneumatic actuator. In this paper, the dynamic characteristics of the McKibben pneumatic actuator was investigated. Next, the stability of the robot's leg motions generated by the actuators was analyzed with these characteristics. From the results of the stability analysis, it is found that the stability of constant posture is satisfied with the dynamic characteristics of the McKibben pneumatic actuator.
