Kinematic and Dynamic Modeling and Simulation Analysis of a Cable-Driven Continuum Robot

Continuum robots are the behavioral-extension of hyper-redundant robots which can belong to biologically inspired robots. These robots differ fundamentally from the rigid robots by having an unconventional structure. They are conceived to mimic the extraordinary capacities of some remarkable structures such as elephant trunks, tentacles and snakes. These robots offer many advantages in terms of high dexterity and maneuverability, handling and grasping objects as well as its lightweight mechanical structure. In this work, we present a kinematic and dynamic modeling of a class of continuum robots namely cable-driven continuum robot and precisely for a planar case. At first, a design of the planar cable-driven continuum robot (P-CDCR) is constructed by using Solidworks software. Then, the mathematical expressions of kinematic models are derived under the assumption of constant curvature of inextensible bending section with zero torsion. The dynamic model of the considered P-CDCR is derived by using the Euler-Lagrange method. Some numerical examples, through Matlab/Simulink software, that validating kinematic and dynamic models are presented and discussed. In addition, to validate the effectiveness and the accuracy of the proposed dynamic model, the obtained results from analytical model are compared to that made up in the Solidworks software through static and nonlinear dynamic cases. From the analysis, it is found that the obtained results for both software are similar to the validating proposed model.