2007 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary
Development of a Parallel Wire Mechanism to Mist the Upper Body Motion and Attitude of Disabled People
| Project/Area Number |
18560129
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Section | 一般 |
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| Research Field |
Design engineering/Machine functional elements/Tribology
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| Research Institution | Kanazawa University |
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Principal Investigator |
TACHIYA Hiroshi Kanazawa University, Graduate School of Natural Science & Technology, Associate Professor (10216989)
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| Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha) |
NISHIMURA Seiji Kanazawa University, Graduate School of Medicine, Assistant Professor (70251965)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2006 – 2007
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| Keywords | Machine Element / Medical and Welfare Assistance / Kinematics / Welfare Equipment / Wire Driven Mechanism / Parallel Mechanism / Upper Body Motion Assist / Upper Body Attitude Assist |
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| Research Abstract |
This study develops an upper body motion assist system that aims at enabling disabled people with lower limb disability to control their upper body motion and attitude holding by their own will. The assist system employs a parallel wire mechanism of which the platform is suspended and moved by wires. Parallel wire mechanisms can arrange the actuators on the base and have advantages such as high power, high speed and high accuracy ; they offer other advantages in lightness and body flexibility due to the wire actuating. Thus, they are suitable for the assist system attached to the body. However, as parallel wire mechanisms have multi-degree-of-freedom and redundancy, the analysis of tension applied to the wires to drive their moving platform is difficult. This paper proposes the effective method for evaluating the maximum wire tension induced by external forces in arbitrary-direction, by the eigenvalue analysis with considering the vector-close condition. The method makes it possible to
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design a parallel wire mechanism to be compact and driven by small force.
By using the proposed method, we actually developed the upper body motion assist system. In order to confirm the assistance effect by the developed assist system on upper body motion, accuracy of positioning and action of forces on human body was considered. Load cell that can measure the variation of wire tension was made and equipped to the developed system. Simultaneously, an image record system that can measure the pose of both the assist system and the wearer was built up. We attached the upper motion assist system to healthy adult mates and confirmed its motion. The behaviors of the wearer and variation of the wire tensions were also measured by the aforementioned measuring system. As a result, the forward-backward flexion, side flexion and swing of the wearer can be assisted accuracy and the exceeded forces are not acted to the body. Thus, the developed parallel wire mechanism is useful to assist the upper body motion. Less
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