Design and Verification of a Novel Triphibian Robot

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel triphibian robot capable of efficient all-terrain operation across land, water, and air by using a morphable mechanism and a cylindrical rolling body, with prototype testing confirming its multi-modal functionality.

Contribution

The paper presents a new triphibian robot design with a morphable mechanism that enables smooth transition between different locomotion modes, addressing bulkiness issues of traditional multi-modal robots.

Findings

Prototype successfully demonstrated multi-modal locomotion

Effective transition between land, water, and air modes

Promising potential for exploration in diverse environments

Abstract

Multi-modal robots expand their operations from one working medium to another, land to air for example. The majorities of multi-modal robots mainly refer to platforms that operate in two different media. However, for all-terrain tasks, there are seldom research to date in the literature. Generally, locomotions in different working media, i.e. land, water and air, require different propelling actuators, and thus the triphibian system becomes bulky. To overcome this challenge, we proposed a triphibian robot and provide the robot with driving forces to perform all-terrain operations in an efficient way. A morphable mechanism is designed to enable the transition between different motion modes, and specifically a cylindrical body is implemented as the rolling mechanism in land mode. Detailed design principles of different mechanisms and the transition between various locomotion modes are analyzed. Finally, a triphibian robot prototype is fabricated and tested in various working media with both mono-modal and multi-modal functionalities. Experiments have verified our platform, and the results show promising adaptions in future exploration tasks in various working scenarios.