Fabrication of four-point biped robot foot module based on contact-resistance force sensor and its evaluation

This paper presents the design of robot foot module of four-point biped walking robot and its fabrication. The foot module has four sensor units based on contact-resistance force sensor. The thin-film-type force sensor is fabricated by coating resistive ink on thin polyimide film using silk screening technique. The simple structure is devised and fabricated to assemble the thin force sensor rigidly. The unit force sensor module is evaluated by the calibration setup to obtain the characteristics of repeatability and hysteresis. The sensor module presents hysteresis error of about 5% and repeatability error of about 0.37%. The calculated zero moment point (ZMP) of the foot module is also compared with the measured position using static load of 50 N. The maximum location error of ZMP is less than 10%. The robot foot module shows the possibility of applying it to humanoid walking.