Kinematic analysis and simulation of Theo Jansen mechanism

Legged robots have come to human's attention dramatically due to their abilities such as either surmounting or dealing with complex obstacles, high level of mobility (changing direction while moving), active suspension using force-controllable actuators in confronting irregular terrains, maneuverability as well as terrain adaptability and so forth. Within few decades, Jansen's wind-powered beach animals found their place among the other types of legged machines. These autonomous creatures are able to live by their own, storing wind energy to move their PVC-made legs, detecting wet sands by the help of implanted nose feelers, escaping from danger by anchoring themselves to the ground. Applications of these marvelous legged mechanisms go beyond human-powered machines such as multi terrain personal transport, multi terrain wheel chair, beach vendor carts, robotic house pets and so forth. In this paper we employed loop closure equations using MATLAB codes for kinematic analysis of Theo Jansen mechanism. Moreover, we performed SolidWorks simulation to validate used method.