A modified discrete gait planning model for quadruped robots is proposed to solve the free gait planning problem for quadruped robots walking beyond barriers. The model accurately simulates the actual physical model through setting related parameters; and the number of candidate footholds can be changed to improve the robot's adaptability according to the distribution density of obstacles. A gait planning algorithm based on the A
*
method is proposed. In this algorithm
the stability detection and collision detection are executed on every gait sequence
and an evaluation function aiming at minimum steps is designed to achieve collision-free and stable gait with minimum total steps. Experimental results show that the proposed algorithm is computationally efficient
and the
planning time is short. When a twenty-step collision-free gait is planned
only 78 nodes are expanded and the planning time is 0.019 s. The robot safely traverses through the obstacles of a given terrain with a minimum steps. These results verify the validity of the proposed model and the superiority of the algorithm. Moreover
a joint simulation with ADAMS and Simulink verifies the feasibility of the planned free gait.
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