Development of a serpentine omnitread robot for searching in explosive gas atmospheres

Purpose – There is explosive gas in many disaster environments. The conventional search and rescue robots are not allowed to work in these environments, since they may cause explosion. The purpose of this paper is to describe the design and development of the serpentine omnitread robot HITSR‐I for working in these areas. Design/methodology/approach – HITSR‐I consists of four segments, and each segment is equipped with crawlers in the four directions. It can be operated even under the situation of sideslip without any recovering actions. There are pressed CO 2 containers and the pressurized control system inside the robot, and the shells of the robot are a fully sealed up structure. They can maintain the inside pressure higher than the outside. The robot can release the communication relay node to extend the communicating area, so it can search a large area even amid rubble. Findings – HITSR‐I was developed with the capability of climbing over 400 mm high obstacles. The maximum travel distance was 315 m. The pressurized system could enable the robot to work in Zones 1 and 2. Originality/value – Design and development of a serpentine robot which can work in hazardous areas containing explosive gas. It can travel for a long distance in ruins by releasing the communication relay nodes.