2-wheeled-2-legged Rickshaw Robot: Replacing Some Wheels with Legs and Programming its Central Pattern Generator

The basic theory of motion of vehicles in a ground plane was covered in chapter 1 where a vehicle can be either a legged or wheeled device. Chapter 3 then used this theory to give motion to a Tricycle Robot which is a 3-wheeled vehicle with no legs. Chapters 4 to 9 then build up a theory of legged motion for a single 3 dof leg. The most important operational technique of leg motion is the ability to guide the leg tip through a programmably shaped and directioned locus, which is explained in chapter 4, and then to develop walking gaits as described in chapter 8. This book leads up finally to the programming of a 6-legged omnidirectional walking robot to carry out a behaviour pattern. However this is a big jump due to the complexity of such a robot. In order to bridge this gap we now introduce a 2-wheeled Rickshaw Robot with 2-legged locomotion, figure 10.1. The Rickshaw Robot is not as complex as the 6-legged robot but brings together the theory of the motion of vehicles whilst introducing the programming of two legs. The Rickshaw Robot thus serves as an ideal 'bridge-the-gap' introduction to complex multi-legged walking robots.