System Design and Kinematic Analysis to Motion Control for RPRS

This paper addresses the modularized structure of the control system and kinematic analysis to motion control for a new planetary rover, reconfigurable planetary robot system (RPRS). In the RPRS, a child-robot with a 6-DOF arm and a wheel can independently locomote and manipulate. Furthermore, the child-robots have self-reconfiguration capability so that multiple child-robots can construct and reconfigure to diverse configurations. Based on distributed controller and CAN, the structure and functions of the control system are decomposed to different modules with independent controllers. The control flow with distributed computation is introduced. The kinematic and inverse kinematic solutions are both educed. The results of this research are also demonstrated through the simulation and experiments of the prototypes