Design of a Differential Drive Mobile Robot Platform for Use in Constrained Environments

Mobile robotics is a growing trend in recent years as mobile robots are being used in service as well as industrial sectors. This paper introduces a novel design of a mobile robot platform for use in constrained workplaces. The constrained environments are nothing but congested places, for example hospitals, ware houses, offices, shop floors where various equipments and machineries are to be arranged in small areas. For robots mobility in such places, various methods are being used such as differential drive system, Omnidirectional mobility etc. This paper presents the design of mobile robotic platform with application of the differential drive system for enhancing mobility of the robotic platform. The 3-D Model of mobile robot is prepared in CAD software CATIA V5R19. The shape of the robot is selected as rectangular, with two driving wheels and two caster wheels. The driving wheels are located at the front side of the robot, which helps the robot to drive on to the slope. Two caster wheels are attached at the back side of the robot for stability purpose. In this robotic platform, the two driving wheels are driven by using independent motors, for forward, backward as well as rotational motion. This designed and developed robotic platform has the capability to implement algorithms for path planning, path control, dynamic steering, obstacle avoidance, position control, image recognition etc.