Stair-capable Vacuum

Wofford, Sawyer; Draper, Benjamin

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Stair-capable Vacuum

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The commercial robotic vacuum is unable to bridge the coverage gaps associated with having multiple levels in a home. Staircases are insurmountable and uncleanable environments to these devices and divide a household into isolated regions. This project proposes a robotic vacuum platform that can unite these regions by traversing and cleaning stairs while maintaining a form factor practical for cleaning the rest of the home. The novel design features a three-stage platform interconnected with scissor lifts, which allows the robot to control its center of gravity and vertically extend to the heights required for stair climbing while retaining a retracted height less than that of a single stair. In tandem with the omnidirectional drive system, sensing capabilities, and wall-following control algorithm, this platform can traverse an entire multilevel home. Development of this platform included conceiving a stair climbing procedure, determining necessary sensors, calculating power requirements, CAD, tolerance analysis, manufacturing and assembly, electrical design, writing firmware, and tuning control algorithms. The resulting prototype stair-capable vacuum met our objectives and provided a proof-of-concept solution to the problem of robotic vacuums’ inability to traverse stairs. The integration of this technology with the commercial robot vacuum would benefit consumers financially and disencumber them from the mundane and straining task of vacuuming stairs.

This report represents the work of one or more WPI undergraduate students submitted to the faculty as evidence of completion of a degree requirement. WPI routinely publishes these reports on its website without editorial or peer review.

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