Performance Characterization of a Resonant-Impact Crawling Robot Driven by Dielectric Elastomer Actuator*

The excellent performance of dielectric elastomer actuators (DEAs) facilitated the development of numerous DEAs-driven crawling robots. These robot designs typically adopt either the two-anchor crawling principle or vibrational crawling based on anisotropic friction. However, these approaches come with certain drawbacks, such as the complex transmission mechanisms. To this end, a resonant-impact DEA-driven crawling robot was proposed, which can greatly reduce the components of the system without any severe compromises in its locomotion performance, and therefore potentially address these limitations. However, due to the unique electromechanical coupled mechanism and nonlinear response of the resonant-impact DEA actuation system, the dynamic model of the robot has yet to be established for further research. Therefore, a dynamic model of the robot in dry friction environments is established, taking into account the nonlinear dynamics of the actuation system and the multiple couplings of the friction between the robot and the contact substrate. By solving and analyzing this numerical model, the locomotion responses of the proposed robot are thoroughly examined. The study investigates the effects of actuation electric field amplitude, robot mass, and friction coefficient on the robot's locomotion performance. The research results presented in this paper offer valuable insights into the design and optimization of the resonant-impact crawling robot.