4. Tests
The robot was tested successfully in a laboratory environment. It was
shown that the mechanical design could cope with the requirements implied by
the mast tip geometry. Especially the motorization of the four vertical cylinders
proved to be substantial. With traction on only the two horizontal units, the
robot could not traverse the mast tip by itself, due to the obstacle geometry and
insufficient friction. Also the rubber coating on the cylinders resulted to be
substantial to increase the friction coefficient.
Figure 5 shows the robot crossing a mast tip. Figure 6 shows the entire
robot together with a human operator for size comparison.