Dynamics and a convenient control design approach for a unicycle robot

In this paper, the dynamics model and a convenient lateral posture stabilization and longitudinal motion control algorithm of a unicycle robot are presented. The unicycle robot consists of a turntable for lateral posture balance, a cylindrical robot body, and a rolling wheel for longitudinal motion control. The dynamics of the unicycle system is derived using the Lagrangian formulation. In the conventional linearized model, important motion characteristics of the unicycle robot system are ignored, which makes against the control performance. To address this problem, a gain scheduling control method is proposed based on the nonlinear model and implemented by coordination of the separated lateral posture balance control and longitudinal motion control. Through simulation studies, the effectiveness of the proposed control algorithm is verified.