OmBURo: A Novel Unicycle Robot with Active Omnidirectional Wheel

TL;DR

OmBURo is a compact unicycle robot with an active omnidirectional wheel that can move and balance dynamically in tight, human-shared spaces, offering high maneuverability and dual-directional movement.

Contribution

This paper introduces OmBURo, a novel unicycle robot with an active omnidirectional wheel enabling simultaneous longitudinal and lateral movement and dynamic balancing.

Findings

Successfully demonstrated station keeping and path following.

Achieved dynamic balance using dual-axis wheeled inverted pendulum.

Showcased potential for use in human environments due to compact design.

Abstract

A mobility mechanism for robots to be used in tight spaces shared with people requires it to have a small footprint, to move omnidirectionally, as well as to be highly maneuverable. However, currently there exist few such mobility mechanisms that satisfy all these conditions well. Here we introduce Omnidirectional Balancing Unicycle Robot (OmBURo), a novel unicycle robot with active omnidirectional wheel. The effect is that the unicycle robot can drive in both longitudinal and lateral directions simultaneously. Thus, it can dynamically balance itself based on the principle of dual-axis wheeled inverted pendulum. This letter discloses the early development of this novel unicycle robot involving the overall design, modeling, and control, as well as presents some preliminary results including station keeping and path following. With its very compact structure and agile mobility, it might be the ideal locomotion mechanism for robots to be used in human environments in the future.