Development of Hydraulic Quadruped Robot and Walking Experiment

Abstract

Legged robots have an advantage for moving on rough terrain. Especially, quadruped robots have high posture stability. However, actuators of many legged robots are actuated by an electromagnetic motor and a speed reducer, and are vulnerable to impact. On the other hand, hydraulic actuators have a simple structure and a small number of parts, thus they are strong against impact and can generate large force. For this reason, hydraulic actuators are used in robot leg mechanisms in recent years. However, there are few development examples of leg mechanisms that achieve both high output and lightweight at the same time. In this study, we developed a hydraulic quadruped robot that has a lightweight leg mechanism and is a self-contained system. A walking experiment of the robot showed that it can walk independently.