Draft: A Parametric Tool for Robot Design Exploration

What happened

arXiv:2609.38405v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Robot performance is often limited by the cost of iterating on morphology and control together, since every computer-aided design (CAD) change has to be carried into a simulation-ready model before control work begins. Co-design methods attempt to close this gap, but each operates with a model generator written for a single platform or lack the use of real-world data to suggest that designs are plausible.

It allows engineers to explore design tradeoffs through easily adjustable models and evaluate how changes influence controller performance. Draft grounds the free parameters of each design using trends fitted to a survey of $114$ actuators (the part of a machine that produces movement) and $49$ published robot descriptions, so that a generated robot is anchored to real-world hardware.

Key facts

• Co-design methods attempt to close this gap, but each — uses: a model generator written for a single platform or lack the use of real-world data to suggest that designs are plausible