Design and Implementation of a Mobile Robot With Variable-Diameter Wheels
Moger G. AtakanVarol H.
2025Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.
IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics
2025#30Issue 42529 - 2538 pp.
Optimal wheel size selection in mobile robots is pivotal in addressing the challenges posed by varying surfaces, navigating complex environments, ensuring stability, and optimizing energy consumption. Targeting this key feature, this article introduces the improbability roller, a mobile robot with two variable-diameter wheels designed to illustrate the significance of wheel size in achieving adaptability and enhancing overall traversability capabilities. The uniqueness of the robot lies in its dynamic ability to adjust the wheel diameter, a mechanism that empowers it to seamlessly switch between different terrains and tasks, by utilizing only three actuators to drive forward/backward, steer, and change the wheel diameters independently. This study not only presents the design of the robot, but also delves into the development of a kinematic model, an open-loop control strategy, and an extensive series of experiments aimed at validating its performance. Through experiments on trajectory tracking, diameter adjustment speeds, steering angle effects, slope climbing capabilities, and energy efficiency considerations, this article underscores the crucial role that a variable-diameter wheel plays in shaping the operational envelope of mobile robots.
Hybrid wheeled mobile robots (WMRs) , kinematic modeling , variable-diameter wheels
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Nazarbayev University, Department of Robotics, School of Engineering and Digital Sciences, Astana, 010000, Kazakhstan
Nazarbayev University
10 лет помогаем публиковать статьи Международный издатель
Книга Публикация научной статьи Волощук 2026 Book Publication of a scientific article 2026