CN112296990A

CN112296990A - Bionic sea snake robot based on rope traction

Info

Publication number: CN112296990A
Application number: CN202011163140.2A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 陈刚; 季文茜; 陈硕; 左金钊; 吴玮
Original assignee: Zhejiang University of Technology ZJUT
Current assignee: Zhejiang University of Technology ZJUT; Zhejiang Sci Tech University ZSTU; Zhejiang University of Science and Technology ZUST
Priority date: 2020-10-27
Filing date: 2020-10-27
Publication date: 2021-02-02

Abstract

The invention relates to an underwater robot. The bionic sea snake robot based on rope traction has the advantages of being small in shape, compact in structure, reliable in work and flexible in movement. The technical scheme is as follows: a bionic sea snake robot based on rope traction comprises a snake head, a plurality of snake body joints and a snake tail which are sequentially connected and respectively sealed and wrapped by waterproof films; the method is characterized in that: the snake head is of a hollow structure, and a control plate and a camera are arranged in the snake head; each snake body joint comprises a joint rack, a flexible rod piece connected with the adjacent joint racks, a plurality of motors and a plurality of traction ropes, wherein the motors are arranged on the joint racks and are uniformly distributed on the periphery of the flexible rod piece; one end of each traction rope is respectively pulled by one motor shaft, and the other end of each traction rope is fixed on the next adjacent joint rack.

Description

Bionic sea snake robot based on rope traction

Technical Field

The invention relates to an underwater robot, in particular to a bionic sea snake robot based on rope traction.

Background

China has abundant ocean resources, and many energy sources are urgently to be developed. However, the submarine environment is complex and changeable, and how to skillfully design and utilize the marine robot to complete underwater operation is very important. The popularization of the 5G technology widens the application field of the mobile robot, so that the mobile robot has wide application prospects, particularly undersea reconnaissance and energy exploration, and is the hot direction of current robot research.

Although the types of robots capable of executing underwater tasks are various at present, a robot capable of executing tasks for a long time in a complex and long and narrow environment under the sea is lacked, and a blind area still exists in an underwater exploration cable.

The body of the snake is soft and slender and has a plurality of unique movement forms to adapt to various environments, so that the snake can move in a complex and long submarine environment. The bionic sea snake robot can have various motion modes such as winding, stretching and retracting, lateral movement and the like a biological snake, and drives torsion from each section of snake body, so that the controllability is very strong, and the bionic sea snake robot has very important significance for executing undersea reconnaissance and exploration.

Disclosure of Invention

The invention aims to provide a rope traction-based bionic sea snake robot which has the characteristics of small shape, compact structure, reliable work and flexible movement.

The technical scheme of the invention is as follows:

a bionic sea snake robot based on rope traction comprises a snake head, a plurality of snake body joints and a snake tail which are sequentially connected and respectively sealed and wrapped by waterproof films; the method is characterized in that:

the snake head is of a hollow structure, and a control plate and a camera are arranged in the snake head;

each snake body joint comprises a joint rack, a flexible rod piece connected with the adjacent joint racks, a plurality of motors and a plurality of traction ropes, wherein the motors are arranged on the joint racks and are uniformly distributed on the periphery of the flexible rod piece; one end of each traction rope is respectively pulled by one motor shaft, and the other end of each traction rope is fixed on the next adjacent joint rack.

The joint rack is a circular sheet with four fixed motors, the flexible rod is connected to the center of the joint rack, and the axis of the flexible rod at the connecting part is perpendicular to the plane of the joint rack.

The four motors are respectively fixed on the joint rack through motor supports and are radially distributed on the periphery of the flexible rod piece; each motor is electrically connected with the control board through a lead respectively to receive control commands.

And a battery is also arranged in the snake head and is communicated with each motor through a power line.

The invention has the beneficial effects that:

the bionic sea snake device adopts a rope structure to simulate the movement mode of advancing and swinging of the sea snake, and drives the traction rope through the rotation of the reel in each section of the sea snake joint, so that each section of the bionic sea snake generates power.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a schematic perspective view of an embodiment of the present invention.

Fig. 2 is a schematic perspective view of two snake body joints (with the joint frame of the first snake body joint removed for clarity) in an embodiment of the invention.

Fig. 3 is a schematic view of the working state of the snake body joint in the embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 4 is a schematic view of the left side steering structure of a certain snake body joint of the invention.

FIG. 5 is a right turning structure diagram of a certain snake body joint of the invention.

Wherein: 1. the snake head comprises a snake head body 2, a joint rack 3, a motor 4, a motor support 5, a scroll 6, a traction rope 7, a flexible rod piece 8 and a snake tail body.

Detailed Description

The invention will be further described with reference to the accompanying drawings, but the invention is not limited to the following examples.

The bionic sea snake robot based on rope traction shown in fig. 1 comprises a snake head and a plurality of (seven segments are shown in the figure) snake body joints. The snake head is a hollow shell, and a control plate (preferably STM32) and a camera are arranged in the snake head; the front of the snake head is provided with a camera hole for observing the camera (the part of the camera hole is provided with waterproof transparent glass). The snake head and each section of snake body are respectively wrapped by a waterproof film in a sealing mode, and accordingly water seepage is prevented, and meanwhile corresponding buoyancy can be provided. Each snake body joint comprises a joint rack 2, a flexible rod 7 and a driving mechanism;

the joint frame 2 is in a circular sheet shape and used for fixing four motor supports 4, and the joint frame 2 can provide a stable working environment for an internal driving mechanism.

The flexible rod 7 is connected to the center of the joint rack 2, and the axis of the flexible rod at the connecting part is vertical to the plane of the joint rack; not only can play the connection supporting role to the joint frame 2, but also can achieve the effect of changing the length of the snake body joint due to the telescopic deformation characteristic of the flexible rod piece (preferably made of rubber materials). One end of each flexible rod piece is fixed with the joint rack of the snake body joint of the section, and the other end of each flexible rod piece is fixed with the joint rack of the next snake body joint; the four motor supports 4 are uniformly distributed around the flexible rod piece. The snake body is also covered with a waterproof film with larger elasticity; when the waterproof film is wrapped in a sealing way, the waterproof film is bonded along the periphery of the joint rack of the snake body joint of the section and the periphery of the joint rack of the next snake body joint, so that a sealing space is formed between the joint racks of the two sections of snake body joints; not only can prevent water and protect the components in the space, but also can make the snake body joint generate buoyancy.

The snake tail 8 is made into a flat shape similar to a fishtail, and the direction can be controlled under the swinging of the snake body joint.

The driving mechanism comprises a motor 3 (a pre-selection servo motor), a motor bracket 4, a scroll 5 and a traction rope 6. Four motor brackets 4 are fixed in each joint frame 2, and each motor bracket is fixed with a motor; the four motor shafts are all arranged outwards and are arranged in an emission shape by taking the flexible rod piece as a center. The motor 3 is fixed on the motor bracket 4, and a scroll 5 is sleeved on a motor shaft; each joint has four segments of traction ropes 6, one end of each traction rope 6 is wound on the reel 5, and the other end of each traction rope 6 is fixed on the next adjacent joint frame.

When the driving mechanism works, the motor 3 is driven by a battery (positioned inside a snake head) to rotate through power supply of a power line, the traction rope is wound and unwound along with the rotation of the reel, meanwhile, the force generated by winding and unwinding the traction rope of the next snake body joint structure is close to or far away from the joint to generate forward driving force, and the flexible rod piece 7 is matched for connection to be beneficial to achieving the flexible change of the distance between the joints.

The rotating speed of the motor 3 is controlled by an STM32 board, the working states of the rotating speed of the four motors 3 of each joint in advancing and all-directional turning are different, and the working state is determined according to the environment detected by the camera in the snake head 1 structure.

Each motor is electrically connected with the control panel through a lead (all located inside the snake head and omitted in the figure), the motors are all waterproof motors, and a battery is also arranged in the snake head to serve as a power supply (omitted in the figure).

The working state process of the present invention is explained in detail below:

1. initial state: each joint of the bionic sea snake robot is flatly suspended in water;

2. advancing: the control panel controls the motor to work, and the snake body joint moves forwards in a winding manner. The kinematic relationship of a certain snake joint is (see fig. 3): the motor 3.1 drives the reel to rotate at a high speed so as to realize the rapid retraction of the traction rope 6.1, and simultaneously, other three motors (3.2, 3.3 and 3.4) rotate at a low speed, and at the moment, the same side (one side of the traction rope 6.1) of the joint rack B (positioned at the top of the figure 3 and clearly removed from the drawing) is retracted to the joint rack A; the flexible rod 7 near this side is also compressed, so that the distance to the left side (the side of the traction rope 6.1) of the whole snake body joint (i.e. A, B the two joint frames are closer to the side of the traction rope 6.1) than to the other three directions (the positions of the other three traction ropes), i.e. the joint i will bend to the left (shown in fig. 4); if the motor in the joint B is reversely controlled (the motor 3.4 drives the reel to rotate at a high speed so as to realize the quick retraction and pulling of the traction rope 6.4, and the other three motors (3.2, 3.3 and 3.1) rotate at a low speed), namely the joint B bends rightwards (shown in figure 5). Therefore, at a certain moment, all the adjacent snake body joints make reverse bending motions (the two adjacent sections in the snake body joints are deviated to opposite directions) on the same side, and the control is repeatedly carried out; the bionic sea snake robot can generate forward twisting driving force to realize the motion effect of winding forward, and the motion track is as the same as a sine wave.

3. Left and right single-side steering: the control panel controls the work of the motor to realize the steering of the snake body. When the bionic sea snake realizes left-side steering, seven sections of snake body structures need to be controlled to bend towards the left side simultaneously. Specifically, a certain segment of the snake body joint in fig. 3 is taken as an example; when the joint turned to the left side (motor 3.1 direction one side), motor 3.1 drove the high-speed rotation of spool to realize that rope 6.1's receipts were drawn fast, other three motors (3.3, 3.2, 3.4) all rotate at a low speed simultaneously, joint frame B's homonymy was received to joint frame A this moment, and flexible member 7 that is close to this side also is compressed, and the distance that realizes whole snake body joint downside (motor 3.1 one side) is nearer than other three directions, and this joint can deflect left promptly (shown in figure 4), bionical sea snake is whole to be the semiarc, produces torsional drive power, realizes that the left turns to.

4. Floating and submerging: the bionic sea snake realizes the similar floating (or submerging) motion principle as that of the motion principle when steering at one side, the upward (or downward) side deflection of the joint can be realized by controlling the high-speed rotation of a motor at one side (or at the bottom) close to the water surface in the snake body joint, seven snake body joints are controlled to simultaneously deflect upward (or downward) side, and the sea snake robot generates the driving force for floating (or submerging) to realize the floating (or submerging) motion form.

Besides the motion form, the bionic sea snake robot can also achieve the motion effect of steering and advancing in an oblique lateral direction, namely, the bionic sea snake robot controls the high-speed rotation of the two motors at the same time, achieves oblique lateral direction steering of a snake body joint, and can achieve forward motion in an oblique lateral direction on the whole snake body.

5. Description of the traveling speed: the rotating speed of the motor during working is adjusted through the control panel, the bionic sea snake robot can obtain driving forces of different sizes, and the bionic sea snake robot has the effect of high-speed and low-speed advancing in the working process.

Claims

1. A bionic sea snake robot based on rope traction comprises a snake head (1), a plurality of snake body joints and a snake tail (8) which are sequentially connected and respectively sealed and wrapped by waterproof films; the method is characterized in that:

each snake body joint comprises a joint rack (2), a flexible rod (7) connected with the adjacent joint racks, a plurality of motors (3) and a plurality of traction ropes (6), wherein the motors (3) and the traction ropes (6) are arranged on the joint racks and are uniformly distributed on the periphery of the flexible rod; one end of each traction rope is respectively pulled by one motor shaft, and the other end of each traction rope is fixed on the next adjacent joint rack.

2. The rope-traction-based biomimetic sea snake robot of claim 1, wherein:

the joint rack is a circular sheet with four fixed motors, the flexible rod is connected to the center of the joint rack 2, and the axis of the flexible rod at the connecting part is perpendicular to the plane of the joint rack.

3. A biomimetic sea snake robot based on rope traction according to claim 2, characterized in that:

the four motors are respectively fixed on the joint rack through motor supports (4) and are radially distributed on the periphery of the flexible rod piece; each motor is electrically connected with the control board through a lead respectively to receive control commands.

4. A biomimetic sea snake robot based on rope traction according to claim 3, characterized in that: and a battery is also arranged in the snake head and is communicated with each motor through a power line.