Control of one-legged robot hopping in place

This paper focuses on one-legged robot hopping in place and presents the corresponding control method based on the angular velocity of torso. By measuring the angular velocity with the use of a gyroscope during flight phase, the hopping robot controller adjusts the toe of the springy leg to the desired location, so as to control the rotational movement of the robot body, which keeps the robot hopping within a small area and maintain its balance. The proposed method depends on neither external sensors like cameras, nor estimates of body location which is easy to diverge gradually. The control algorithm is then verified by co-simulation based on ADAMS and Simulink. Our simulation further showed that the robot was also able to recover from external disturbance in time. The proposed hopping control algorithm and co-simulation results provided a basis for one-legged robot physical prototype development.