Design and Implementation of Small Scale Joint Controllers for a Humanoid Robot

Student: Timothy Cartwright

Supervisor: Dr. Gordon Wyeth

Category: Electrical Engineering Thesis Project

This thesis describes the design and development of the distributed motor control system for use in the GuRoo humanoid robot. Specifically this thesis deals with the upper body systems and communication protocols. The GuRoo robot has had no previous work carried out on it and as such the design of all components was done in parallel. Limited humanoid projects are currently being undertaken worldwide and this is the first to be attempted at the University of Queensland.

The design described in this thesis covers the electrical design and testing of the RC servo motor controller board for the upper body control of GuRoo. Each controller board uses a Digital Signal Processor (DSP) for control of each system of joints. Previous work has involved each joint having a separate controller; because of space constrictions within a humanoid each board is designed to control multiply joints. The reasons behind the decisions for this configuration are given as well as full details of the solution obtained.

Within this thesis the operating software for the joint control is detailed along with the communication to the iPAQ via the Controller Area Network (CAN) protocol. The servo control system has been tested and the responses under different conditions are discussed. CAN communications are still in testing with further work required to integrate the network of all the joints with the iPAQ.

Poster Presentation (PDF)

Thesis Document (PDF)