Leg modules
Hip and knee geometry, joint serviceability, link stiffness, and foot contact data.
Active project
Alpha Dog
A compact four-legged robot for actuator experiments, stance control, impact tolerance, and repeatable gait development.
Current phase: Leg testbed
Alpha Dog quadruped
Subsystem
Quadruped locomotion
Focus
Gait control
Status
Leg testbed
Technical overview
A quadruped program centered on measurable leg behavior before speed.
Alpha Dog starts with the hard parts of locomotion: joint geometry, contact sensing, impact loads, current capture, and slow repeatable gait work.
Body
Rigid spine layout, protected wiring, battery access, IMU placement, and impact tolerance.
Controls
Stance stability, crawl patterns, current limits, attitude logging, and recovery experiments.
Development timeline
Build phases.
01
Leg geometry
Lock the hip and knee geometry around reachable stride length, ground clearance, and repairable joints.
02
Single leg bench
Validate torque, backlash, foot contact sensing, and impact behavior before building the full body.
03
Body integration
Package four leg modules, the spine, battery, controller, IMU, and service access into one chassis.
04
Gait experiments
Run stance, crawl, trot, disturbance, and recovery tests with measured current and attitude data.
Hardware specifications
Current target architecture.
Alpha Dog keeps the first milestones focused on one leg, then the body, then controlled locomotion with measured data.
Roadmap
Next engineering work.
Complete a single instrumented leg and static load fixture.
Design a rigid spine that keeps electronics serviceable after hard impacts.
Implement stance and slow crawl before increasing gait speed.
Record fall and recovery behavior as engineering data, not just demo clips.