Explicit lateral force control of an autonomous mobile robot with slip

In this paper, lateral force control of a mobile robot in contact with an object or environment is presented. Considering slip condition of wheels, the front wheel steered bicycle model of the mobile robot is derived. The explicit force control algorithm is applied to regulate contact force generated from the object which minimizes a force error between a desired force and an actual force. Performances of force tracking control for different stiffness of environment have been tested. Simulation results show that the proposed control algorithm works quite well to maintain desired contact force on the environment.