An investigation of dynamic behavior of a pointed-mass convex-sole biped walker with and without a passive controller

Minimizing the energy expenditure as well as structure’s size and weight is of a great important in biped walking robots. To achieve this target, a passive controller, which is a combination of spring and linear damper, is added to a biped walker. The important specification of the studied walker is that it has two convex soles at the end of the legs as feet, which is jointed to body with a passive revolute joint. Contact point moves on a sole curve. To reduce system's dynamic complexity, pointed mass approach is used. The main purpose of this research is studying the dynamical behavior of this underactuated walker before and after adding controller. In the first step, a model based on developed pointed mass model is offered and analyzed by adding two rigid convex soles as feet and passive revolute joint as ankle. To make leg length changes during walking, an active dynamic element is used. Next, a passive controller or dynamic element is used with the active one to reduce active element role during movement. Particle swarm optimization method is used to minimize this role by calculating optimized passive element parameters. The results show using the combination of optimized passive and active dynamic elements, the amount of energy consumption is decreased significantly. As a result, we can use a much smaller active element with less power to walk. Also using a passive dynamic element practically improves mechanical specifications of the structure such as dimensions and weight as well as providing simple use for users.