Abstract
Human beings and animals have remarkable abilities to walk, run and jump over a wide variety of hazard terrains. These actions in general are dynamic activities in which inertial forces are significant and balance is achieved by dynamic responses. We have been devloping an artistic robot ""Jumping Joe"" with capability of jumping, walking and rotating. Jumping Joe is an artistic, agile robot that walks on two legs and performs acrobatic moves. The design is shown in Fig. 1. The main objective of this robot is the development of new behavior like jumping, rolling and their combinations. In order to realize acrobatic movements like rapid getting-up, walking, jumping, somersault, 4 kinds of actuators that enable high-speed movement are installed. The inertia actuator installed in the upper body is a torque generator that consists of Gyro and brake mechanisms. The each of hip joints consists of a 2 DOF actuator developed on a basis of parallel link mechanisms for achieving light weight and high torque. The knee joints are 1 DOF, high torque mechanisms employing a lever-crank mechanism. The each jumping part consists of a special designed cam and torsion spring called cam-charger. Each actuator is developed as an independent module, with the movements being controlled by microcomputers. The central IC is a rewritable FPGA that controls each microcomputer and communicates wirelessly with host computer via Bluetooth.
