Torque-limited simple pendulum: A toolkit for getting familiar with control algorithms in underactuated robotics

There are many, wildly different approaches to robotic control. Underactuated robots are systems for which it is not possible to dictate arbitrary accelerations to all joints. Hence, a controller cannot be used to override the system dynamics and force the system on a desired trajectory as it often is done in classical control techniques. A torque-limited pendulum is arguably the simplest underactuated robotic system and thus is a suitable system to study, test and benchmark different controllers.

This repository describes the hardware (Computer-aided design (CAD) models, Bill Of Materials (BOM), etc.) required to build a physical pendulum system and provides the software (Unified Robot Description Format (URDF) models, simulation and controller) to control it. It provides a setup for studying established and novel control methods, and targets students and researchers interested in studying underactuation.