Study on Rough Terrain Traversability of Rover Mobility System with Active Suspension(Mechanical Systems)

Abstract

In planetary missions, rovers that can traverse over rough terrain are required in order to explore craters and slopes which have high scientific value. Rovers with wheeled locomotive system are used broadly in planetary missions, because the wheeled locomotive system has low energy consumption and its configuration is simpler than other types of locomotive system, such as the tracked locomotive system. However, wheeled robots have low traversability. In order to solve this problem, various methods have been developed. For example, the rocker bogie suspension is one of the most well-known methods to improve traversability. Sojourner and MER have a rocker-bogie suspension that has worked successfully on Mars. To traverse over more challenging terrain, however, passive suspension is inadequate. Recently, several rovers with active suspension have been studied. In this paper, the authors propose a new mobility system with active suspension, which has high efficiency and high traversability. The simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed mobility system in its ability to climb slopes and its stability from tip over when traversing various rough terrain using active suspension.