Design and control of a 5-wheeled wheelchair with an active-caster drive system

2017 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15K01454
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Rehabilitation science/Welfare engineering
• Research Institution: Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology
• Principal Investigator: Wada Masayoshi 東京農工大学, 工学(系)研究科(研究院), 准教授 (80406537)
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2018-03-31
• Keywords: 福祉・介護用ロボット / 車いす / 電動化システム / アクティブキャスタ

Outline of Final Research Achievements

An add-on drive system for a manual wheelchair was developed. The active-caster, which has been developed for omnidirectional mobile robots, was applied to the add-on drive system. Single active-caster is mounted on the back side of a manual wheelchair for running on the ground as a normal electric wheelchair. Additionally a link mechanism which varies relative position of the active-caster to a wheelchair was designed. The mechanism allows the wheelchair to flip up front casters without dynamic balance controls, called as “static wheelie”. By using the proposed static wheelie, ascending and descending of a 10cm-step by a developed algorithm. To eliminate the complex manual operation for the step climbing procedure, semi-automatic system was developed. Based on sensor data, a series of step climbing motions are realized by automatic system by a trigger of a wheelchair user.

Free Research Field

機械力学、機械制御