Rapid Change of Running Direction for Biped Robots

In this paper, a method for a biped to quickly change its running direction is proposed. To change the running direction of the biped robot, a rotation of the body is needed. When the robot rotates its body during a support phase, however, there may be a few limitations such as the workspace of hardware and the time. To overcome these limitations, the running direction of the biped robot is changed during a flight phase as well as a support phase. The angular velocity for turning in a flight phase is generated during a support phase by rotating the body. The biped robot is assumed as a model that consists of a rigid body and a particle. The rigid body and the particle mean the upper body of the robot and the swing leg, respectively. By using this model, an effect of angular momentum that generated by rotation of the swing leg is reduced. The performance of the proposed method is verified in computer 3D simulations of a biped robot.