空気圧駆動ウェアラブルデバイスのための小型空気圧供給システムの開発

—第2報：空気圧エネルギーの推定と空気圧供給システムの制御—

抄録

The portable air supply system for wearable device had been developed in previous works. The previous system, which can retrieve compressed air from an actuator, is effective to decrease energy consumption. However, supplying / retrieving compressed air into / from an actuator and generating compressed air by compressor can not be performed simultaneously because energy flowed into / out a tank can not be measured directly. Establishment of estimation of pneumatic energy is desirable in order to control inner pressure of actuator continuously in future works. Air flow must be required to calculate pneumatic energy. However, the system becomes large by introducing air flow sensors. Air flow passed through an orifice plate can be calculated by both sides pressure of an orifice plate. Accordingly, air flow can be calculated by assuming an air valve to be an orifice plate. Real-time energy estimation will enable to supply / retrieve compressed air and to generate compressed air simultaneously. In this paper, the energy estimation method is discussed, and then the operation flow for this system based on pneumatic energy is described. Finally, experiment using actual system is performed to verify the proposed method.