• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2006.05a
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• pp.63-64
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• 2006

In this paper, design modification was performed to improve the structure of ex-developed 12 D.O.F Biped walking robot, KUBIR-1 similar with human beings. The motion of KUBIR-1 was slow and had a limited walking space. Hence I designed an improved BWR named KUBIR-2 with 12 degree of freedom. KUBIR-2 was designed to solve the following problems of KUBIR-1. First, KUBIR-2 was more simply designed in the four-bar-link mechanism, and its weight was reduced. Second, it had the built-in controller and motor driver. Third, walking velocity of KUBIR-2 was increased by improvement of speed and motion joint angle range. In addition to these, we modified the structure of the foot for more stable walking.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.41 no.8
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• pp.771-782
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• 2017

This paper describes the development of a wearable robot to assist ankle power for the elderly. Previously developed wearable robots have generally used motors and gears to assist muscle power during walking. However, the combination of motor and reduction gear is heavy and has limitations on the simultaneous control of stiffness and torque due to the friction of the gear reducer unlike human muscles. Therefore, in this study, Mckibben pneumatic muscle, which is lighter, safer, and more powerful than an electric motor with gear, was used to assist ankle joint. Antagonistic actuation using a pair of pneumatic muscles assisted the power of the soleus muscles and tibialis anterior muscles used for the pitching motion of the ankle joint, and the model parameters of the antagonistic actuator were experimentally derived using a muscle test platform. To recognize the wearer's walking intention, foot load and ankle torque were calculated by measuring the pressure and the center of pressure of the foot using force and linear displacement sensors, and the stiffness and the torque of the pneumatic muscle joint were then controlled by the calculated ankle torque and foot load. Finally, the performance of the developed ankle power assistive robot was experimentally verified by measuring EMG signals during walking experiments on a treadmill.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.11 no.6
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• pp.1787-1792
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• 2016

Previous walking pattern generation methods could generate walking patterns that allow only straight walking on flat and uneven terrain. They were unable to generate modifiable walking patterns whereby the sagittal and lateral step lengths and walking direction can be changed at every footstep. This paper proposes a novel walking pattern generation method to realize modifiable walking of humanoid robots on unknown uneven terrain. The proposed method employs a walking pattern generator based on the 3-D linear inverted pendulum model (LIPM), which enables a humanoid robot to vary its walking patterns at every footstep. A control strategy for walking on unknown uneven terrain is proposed. Virtual spring-damper (VSD) models are used to compensate for the disturbances that occur between the robot and the terrain when the robot walks on uneven terrain with unknown height. In addition, methods for generating the foot and vertical center of mass (COM) of the 3-D LIPM trajectories are developed to realize stable walking on unknown uneven terrain. The proposed method is implemented on a small-sized humanoid robot platform, DARwIn-OP and its effectiveness is demonstrated experimentally.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2005.06a
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• pp.1780-1783
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• 2005

In this paper ZMP was considered in order to get a walking stability, so the gait in the stable domain was realized through putting the stability margin in the sole domain of a foot. It is assumed that the robot's legs have 12 joints to operate a open-loop drive and there was no external disturbance under walking phases, additionally, the robot is walking on the flat plane. It was observed that the robot's walking trajectory, locus of COM and ZMP after imposing the motion to each joint. For realizing the simulation considering ZMP and movement of mass center, it was checked if it is stable for the constraint robot model to walk in stability and the feasibility was estimated about its dynamic gait. Eventually it was shown that a constraint gait algorithm is able to realize. To verify the proper walking process, ZMP(Zero Moment Point) theory is applied and the simulation has been done by ADAMS.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Intelligent Systems
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.51-56
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• 2013

In order to apply a biped robot in real world, the robot requires a robust walking and a function of localization, path planning and navigation. Recently, localization and path planning using RFID of mobile robot has been studying. However, when the biped robot walks, it has unstability and tends to leave the path. In the paper we propose a method of walking stabilization using FSR(Force Sensing Resistor), Gyro and accelerometer for the real biped robot. Also a path tracking algorithm using RFID sensor attached in robot's foot is proposed based on localization of the robot. The proposed algorithm is verified from walking experiments using real biped robot on uneven terrain and path tracking experiments on the RFID environments.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.64 no.1
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• pp.136-142
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• 2015

In the paper, a design method of knee and pelvis joint in the biped robot is proposed for shock absorption and gravity compensation. Similarly to the human's body, the knee joints of the biped robot support most body weight and get a shock from the landing motion of the foot on the floor. The torque of joint motor is also increased sharply to keep the balance of the robot. Knee and pelvis joints with the spring are designed to compensate the gravity force and reduce the contact shock of the robot. To verify the efficiency of the proposed design method, we develope a biped robot with the joint mechanism using springs. At first, we experiment with the developed robot on the static motions such as the bent-knee posture both without load and with load on the flat ground, and the balance posture on the incline plane. The current of knee joint is measured to analyze the impact force and energy consumption of the joint motors. Also, we observe the motor current of knee and pelvis joints for the walking motion of the biped robot. The current responses of joint motors show that the proposed method has an effect on shock reduction and gravity compensation, and improve the energy efficiency of walking motions for the biped robot.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.34 no.9
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• pp.1145-1151
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• 2010

In this paper, we discuss the design and simulation of a jumping-robot mechanism that is actuated by SMA (shape memory alloy) wires. We propose a jumping-robot mechanism; the structure of the robot is inspired by the musculoskeletal system of vertebrates, including humans. Each robot leg consists of three parts (a thigh, shank, and foot) and three kinds of muscles (gluteus maximus, rectus femoris, and gastrocnemius). The jumping capability of the robot model was tested by means of computer simulations, and it was found that the robot can jump to about four times its own height. This robot model was also compared with another model with a simpler structure, and the performance of the former, which was based on the biomimetic design, was 3.3 times better than that of the latter in terms of the jumping height. The simulation results also verified that SMA wires can be suitable actuators for small jumping robots.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.34 no.6
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• pp.667-673
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• 2010

This paper proposes a control method based on a pseudo-impedance model to control the motion of biped robots walking on an uneven surface. The pseudo-impedance model simulates the action of the ankle of a foot landing on the ground when a human walks. When the foot is in contact with the ground, the human ankle goes through two different phases. In the first phase, the human exerts little or no effort and applies no torque on the ankle so that the orientation of the foot is effortlessly and passively adjusted with respect to the ground. In the second phase of landing, the ankle generates a significant amount of torque in order to rotate and move the main part of the human body forward and to support the weight of the human; this phase is called the weight acceptance phase. Computer simulations of a 12-DOF biped robot with a 6-DOF environment model were performed to determine the effectiveness of the proposed pseudo-impedance control. The simulation results show that stable locomotion can be achieved on an irregular surface by using the proposed model.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Intelligent Systems
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.159-164
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• 2011

In this study, a crab robot is implemented in H/W based on four-bar linkage mechanism and Jansen mechanism, and its kinematics is analysed. A vision camera is attached to the mechanism, which makes the proposed robot a kind of biologically inspired robot for image acquisition. Three ultrasonic sensors are adopted for obstacle avoidance. In addition, the biologically inspired robot can achieve the mission appointed by a programmer outside, based on RF and Blue-tooth communication module. For the design and implementation of a crab robot, it is need to get joint variable, a foot point, and their relation. Thus, the proposed kinematic analysis is very important process for the design and implementation of legged robots.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Intelligent Systems
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.443-448
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• 2006

In this paper, a novel method is proposed for generating the low-power and stable walking trajectory of biped robots, and then a biped robot with 25 DOFs(degrees of freedom) is designed and implemented for the realization of the low-power walking trajectory generated by the proposed method. In our method, first a stable VPCG(vertically projected center of gravity) trajectory is generated, and then the trajectories of ankle and pelvis of a biped robot are planned to follow the preplanned stable VPCG trajectory, which produces a waking pattern without bending its knees and enables a biped robot to walk with less power consumption. On the other hand, a biped robot implemented in this paper has the mechanical structure of foot that enables a biped robot to support on the ground well, and the mechanical structure of pelvis that enables a biped robot to move flexibly. From results of the walking experiment and power consumption measurement, it was confirmed that the proposed method can generate the more stable and flexible trajectory with less power consumption compared with the existing methods which do not use the ankle of a biped robot.