In order to realise the synchronous drive of the insulator inspection robot with a simple control system, a single drive crawling device of the robot is designed. This device has a three-degree freedom (3-DOF) differential drive system which can be driven by a motor to make the three sets of arm crawl synchronously. It has a certain ability of self-adaption and compensating output errors. First, the crawling device's assembly model of insulator inspection robot is designed. Then the kinematics analysis is established. In addition, a kineto-statics model is founded to analyse the total torque and the stress state of the contact points when the device is crawling. Finally, simulation is used to analyse and the error adjustment of crawling device is studied. After theoretical analysis and dynamic simulation of the crawling device, results show that it has a certain ability of error adjustment.

This article was published on International Journal of Industrial and Systems Engineering,30(4),512-535.titledAnalysis on the characteristics for a new differential crawling device of an insulator inspection robot.