A novel macro/micro dual driving miniature mobile robot for precision manipulation

This paper describes a novel dual moving miniature mobile robot facing on precision manipulation and its wireless control system. This robot is composed of moving allocation unit based on macro/micro dual moving manner and spherical manipulator with three degrees of freedom. The whole robot occupies a volume of 60mm/spl times/50mm/spl times/50mm. In the macro-moving manner, using the SMOOVY (a company in Switzerland) motor with the diameter of 3mm, the robot can move with a high speed of 100mm/s. And the positioning accuracy is up to 0.5mm with the motion resolution of 0.1mm. In the micro moving manner, with the principle of inchworm, the robot can move at a speed of 0.2mm/s with 50/spl mu/m positioning accuracy and 2/spl mu/m resolution. Three piezo-ceramic tubes based on the principle of stick-slip drive the spherical manipulator. The manipulator can rotate around z-axis and move up and down. The accuracy of spherical manipulator is 0.001 degree. All driving circuits are integrated in the body of robot. Two polymeric Lithium-metal cells are selected as the power supply. The robot communicates with the image processing system through a Bluetooth model. For convenient control, the locomotion of robot is divided into several simple motion modes. By applying the multiple threads technology to program, real time control is achieved.