Improving rover mobility through traction control: simulating rovers on the Moon

Abstract

Abstract This paper shows the performance of various traction control strategies that aim to minimize slippage and wheel fighting by properly adjusting the velocity of each traction wheel in a planetary rover. These strategies are validated through simulations performed in ANVEL (Quantum Signal LLC) and using two rovers currently employed by NASA. These experiments use similar features to those that a planetary rover would face on the Moon such as terrain geomorphology and lunar gravity. After running those experiments, the following conclusions were drawn: (1) when no traction control is considered, results show the rover gets entrapped or makes a shorter progress than when traction control is applied; (2) the proposed traction controllers demonstrate a proper balance between slip-compensation (lowest mean slip) and reduction of wheel fighting effects (less aggressive control actions); (3) after considering two different planetary rovers, it is observed that the mechanical configuration effects slip reduction. These contributions can also be observed in the accompanying videos.