Abstract
Based on the past experiments of the leg orthosis with powered knee joint for the spinal cord injured, we realized the necessity of stiffness/compliance design, smooth control of the mechanism, and energy saving concept. We are designing several types of quasi-passive walking machine from this viewpoint, and made many experiments so far. This time we designed ankle driven type of quasi-passive walking machine assuming to be applicable to the leg orthosis in the future. We described the design considerations of the driving mechanism and kinematic structure, and showed the basic experiments to evaluate the validity of machine design.
