Joint control of the six-legged robot AirBug driven by fluidic muscles

Pneumatic muscles as actuators offer several advantages due to their performance weight relation or to the passive compliance of this type of actuators. Passive compliance is an important component for the control of locomotion in rough terrain to absorb the power stroke energy. This paper presents the mechatronics of a six-legged insect-like robot AirBug with pneumatic muscles as actuators. The main focus lies on the control concept of the antagonistic actuators.