Design, modeling and control of a hopping robot

The authors report progress towards model based, dynamically stable legged locomotion with energy efficient, electrically actuated robots. The present the mechanical design of a prismatic robot leg which is optimized for electrical actuation. A dynamical model of the robot and the actuator as well as the interaction with ground is derived and validated by demonstrating close correspondence between simulations and experiments. A new continuous, and exactly implementable open loop torque control algorithm is introduced which stabilizes a limit cycle of the underlying fourth order intermittent robot/actuator/environment dynamics.