New Ring Shaped Flying Robots that can Stand and Roll with Variable Pitch Propellers for Multi-Field Applications
Koji Kawasaki, Moju Zhao, Kei Okada, Masayuki Inaba · Journal of the Robotics Society of Japan · 2014
In order to enable disaster rescue and information collection for disaster aid, we have been working to develop collaborative field robot system with multi-rotor extended robots. In this paper, we propose new multi-rotor flying robots that have special functions beyond flying ability. The robot is named MUWA: Multi-field Universal Wheel for Air-land Vehicle with Quad Variable-pitch Propellers. MUWA is variable pitch quad-rotors flying robot for multi-field locomotion, that is, standing and rolling at a given tilt angle on the ground like a tire, along with floating and moving on the water surface. The robot's purpose for action, structural design, basic control, and experiment of multi-field verification are covered.