Slip, Traction Control, and Navigation of a Lunar Rover

This paper investigates dynamics, control and navigation of a lunar rover with special attention to slip and traction mechanics of the wheels. Case studies are made for a rover that negotiates with natural rough terrain, or slips and sticks on loose soil such as regolith, which covers most of lunar surface. The tire traction force is modeled as a function of slip ratio, considering the distribution of normal and share stress under the wheel. Bekker’s terramechanic formulae are employed to derive an improved practical model that calculates net traction force, referred to as Drawbar Pull, with reasonable precision. When a tire spins on loose soil, the soil is removed and the tire penetrates in the surface, then the motion disturbance increases. This effect is also modeled as a function of the tire slip ratio. Experiments are carried out with a single-wheel test bed to observe the physical phenomena, then off-line analysis is carried out to verify the tire traction model and identify empirical parameters. Dynamic simulations are developed to be compared with the experimental observation. Through the experiments and simulations, it is clarified that the traversability of a rover is improved by even distribution of vertical load on each tire. Slipbased traction control is also developed and tested. The slip-based control is verified effective to prevent the wheels from spinning or penetrating into the soil.

[1]  Steven Dubowsky,et al.  Vehicle Wheel-Ground Contact Angle Estimation: With Application to Mobile Robot Traction Control , 2000 .

[2]  Christophe Grand,et al.  A simulation system for behaviour evaluation of ofi-road mobile robots , 2001 .

[3]  Steven Dubowsky,et al.  Experimental Validation of Physics-Based Planning and Control Algorithms for Planetary Robotic Rovers , 1999, ISER.

[4]  Donald B. Bickler,et al.  The new family of JPL planetary surface vehicles , 1993 .

[5]  Paolo Fiorini.  Ground mobility systems for planetary exploration , 2000, Proceedings 2000 ICRA. Millennium Conference. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation. Symposia Proceedings (Cat. No.00CH37065).

[6]  Jo Yung Wong,et al.  Theory of ground vehicles , 1978 .

[7]  Kazuya Yoshida,et al.  MOTION DYNAMICS OF EXPLORATION ROVERS ON NATURAL TERRAIN : EXPERIMENTS AND SIMULATION , 2022 .

[8]  Kazuya Yoshida,et al.  Motion dynamics and control of a planetary rover with slip-based traction model , 2002, SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing.

[9]  C. R. Weisbin,et al.  Robotics Technology for Planetary Missions into the 21st Century , 1997 .

[10]  H. Das,et al.  Autonomous Rover Technology for Mars Sample Return , 1999 .

[11]  Yasuharu Kunii,et al.  Low Power Mobility System for Micro Planetary Rover Micro 5 , 1999 .

[12]  M. G. Bekker.  Introduction to Terrain-Vehicle Systems , 1969 .

[13]  Steven Dubowsky,et al.  MOBILE ROBOT ROUGH-TERRAIN CONTROL (RTC) FOR PLANETARY EXPLORATION , 2000 .

[14]  Shane Farritor,et al.  Physics-based planning for planetary exploration , 1998, Proceedings. 1998 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (Cat. No.98CH36146).

[15]  Steven Dubowsky,et al.  On-line terrain parameter estimation for planetary rovers , 2002, Proceedings 2002 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (Cat. No.02CH37292).

[16]  J. Balaram.  Kinematic observers for articulated rovers , 2000, Proceedings 2000 ICRA. Millennium Conference. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation. Symposia Proceedings (Cat. No.00CH37065).

[17]  Kazuya Yoshida,et al.  Motion dynamics of a rover with slip-based traction model , 2002, Proceedings 2002 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (Cat. No.02CH37292).

[18]  Makoto Miyata,et al.  DESIGNING OF LUNAR ROVERS FOR HIGH WORK PERFORMANCE , 1999 .