QLAUN: A Research-Oriented, Robust, Agile, Modular, and Affordable Torque-Controlled Quadruped Robot

Abstract

QLAUN Bot (Quad-Legged Adaptive Unmanned Navigator Robot) is a torque-controlled quadruped robot that is research-oriented, cost-effective, and aimed at achieving simultaneous robustness and agility while being completely 3D-printed. It is a quadruped robot that is aimed at empowering robotics research at universities and research institutes in Lebanon and the MENA region. Using a novel electronics-free leg design strategy, we present a modular robot with interchangeable and easily replaceable legs. The 15 kg robot possesses 12 DoF (Degrees-of-Freedom) with three per leg, each paired with a completely 3D-printed Quasi-Direct Drive (QDD) actuator that consists of a brushless DC motor and a low-ratio gearbox transmission that is connected to a belt transmission system for significantly increasing the torque outputs at the joints. We present legs that have decoupled hip and knee actuators to improve the overall modularity of the robot. QLAUN is almost completely 3D-printed using polylactic acid (PLA) and assembled using off-the-shelf parts to create a robust, agile, and affordable robot for legged robot locomotion research. The legs possess joints with wide ranges of motion, including a continuous hip flexion-extension joint. A compliant foot, printed using TPU-95A is also implemented for alleviating hard impacts and handling terrain uncertainties. This extended abstract aims to introduce QLAUN, a novel platform for robotics research, emphasizing the design concepts and principles that underpin its development to the academic and research communities in the field of robotics.