This paper describes a study on posture control of the multi-legged biomimetic underwater robot (CALEB10). Because the underwater environment has a feature that all degrees of freedom are coupled to each other, we designed the posture control algorithm by separating each degree of freedom. Not only should the research on posture control of underwater robots be a precedent study for position control, but it is also necessary to compensate disturbance in each direction. In the research on the yaw directional posture control, we made the drag force generated by the stroke of the left leg and the right leg occur asymmetrically, in order that a rotational moment is generated along the yaw direction. In the composite swimming controller in which the controllers in each direction are combined, we designed the algorithm to determine the control weights in each direction according to the error angle along the yaw direction. The performance of the proposed posture control method is verified by a dynamical simulator and underwater experiments.

The CALEB10 is a multi-legged biomimetic underwater robot. In the last research, we developed a swimming pattern named ESPG (Extended Swimming Pattern Generator) by observing diving beetle’s swimming actions and experimented with a positive buoyancy state in which CALEB10 floats on the water. In this paper, however, we have experimented with CALEB10 in a neutral buoyancy state where it is completely immersed in water for pitch motion control experiment. And we found that CALEB10 was unstably swimming in the pitch direction in the neutral buoyancy state and analyzed that the reason was due to the weight proportion of the legs. In this paper, we propose a pitch motion control method to mimic the pitch motion of diving beetles and to solve the problem of CALEB10 unstably swimming in the pitch direction. To control the pitch motion, we use the method of controlling additional joints while swimming with the ESPG. The method of obtaining propulsive force by the motion of the leg has a problem of giving propulsive force in the reverse direction when swimming in the surge direction, but this new control method has an advantage that a propulsive moment generated by a swimming action only on a target pitch value. To demonstrate validity this new control method, we designed a dynamics-based simulator environment. And the control performance to the target pitch value was verified through simulation and underwater experiments.