Author(s)

Defa Zhang, Weihua Zhou, Bing Zheng, Xiaofen Li, Ban Wang, and Jifeng Guo

Corresponding Author

Bing Zheng

ABSTRACT

While researches on the single row alternate wheel and its mobile robot are not rarely seen, this paper offers a creative way different from past studies to analyze their self-lock characteristic by means of friction analysis. In the first stage, we analyze the structure of the single row alternate wheel. Statistics demonstrate when the single wheel is locked, it mainly creates three types of fiction: the sliding fiction along the radial direction of the wheel, and the rolling and bearing fiction along the axial direction. Experiments are designed to measure the friction coefficients. Next, we introduce the self-lock characteristic of the single row alternate wheel based on the frictions measured above. Finally, we derive a mathematical model to calculate the force on the self-locked mobile robot. Experiments are designed to test the characteristic of the mobile robot on different materials like paper and carpet, which validate the mathematical model. The results of this study contribute to a more comprehensive evaluation of various types of motion characteristics of the omni-directional wheels.

KEYWORDS

single row alternate wheel, friction model, self-lock characteristic, mobile robot