RAPID PROTOTYPING OF A GAIT GENERATION METHOD USING REAL-TIME HARDWARE IN LOOP SIMULATION

Formal control design techniques usually rely on the plant model of a desired system. The plant model can be derived from the foundation principles of the system but often includes unidentified parameters. In order to approximate these unknown parameters, experiments are conducted to collect information from the behavior of plant dynamics. Thus, closed-loop feedback control methods can be formulated upon the estimation of an appropriate plant model using simulation techniques. Rapid prototyping techniques support this design paradigm which requires that the rapid prototype operate in real time, interact with real hardware and have supporting control functionality. This paper delivers a study on the modeling and testing of a gait generation method using a rapid prototyping technique. The objective is to develop a method of rapid prototyping to test new walking algorithms on a real-time robotic system. The paper addresses the drawbacks of a non-real-time simulation by evaluating the locomotion of a six-legged robot in terms of tracking errors and signifies the proposed methodology of tuning the gait generation algorithm online through real-time hardware in loop simulation setup. Finally, the paper inspects the improved locomotion of the robot using the proposed methodology and signifies it as a valid prototyping technique for approximating novel gait generation algorithms on real-time robotic systems.