Abstract
The purpose of this study is investigation of the mechanical properties of foods which is necessary to determine the suitable speed and torque of the meal supporting equipment's actuator of spoon. As the method of investigation of the mechanical properties of foods, the loads of spoon are measured. Therefore, four pressure sensors are fixed to spoon of the equipment. Foods are classified to three types, these are solid foods, fluid foods and semi-solid foods. For this meal supporting equipment, the motion of spooning up imitates human's one. According to the experiment, in case of semisolid foods, the speed of spooning up foods affects the success rate of spooning. While, in case of solid foods and fluid foods, the speed of spooning up foods hardly affects the success rate of spooning. In the next stage, by using these test result, the data base of the mechanical properties of foods will be created.
