Host: The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers
Name : [in Japanese]
Date : May 10, 2017 - May 13, 2017
In this paper, we developed two knee assist exoskeletons with a variable stiffness mechanism. These exoskeletons support human knee torque through increasing the stiffness during stance phases and decreasing the stiffness during swing phases. We conducted experiments to evaluate the assist effects. In the experiment, we compared three conditions: the subject did not wear the exoskeleton, the subject wore the exoskeleton and the exoskeleton did not support torque of the subject, and the subject wore the exoskeleton and the exoskeleton supported torque of the subject. We measured metabolic energy of the all conditions. As a result, we verified that the variable stiffness exoskeleton reduce 13.4[%] of metabolic energy. We made an improved exoskeleton that is 1.2[kg] lighter than the old one, and has a variable stiffness mechanism using not a servomotor but an electromagnetic clutch. This mechanism can realize more quick stiffness adjustment and energy saving. We verified that this improved exoskeleton can adjust stiffness.
