Portable Soft Pneumatic Actuator using Reversible Chemical Reaction

-7 th report: Development of Soft PEFC and Balloon Actuator-

Abstract

A pneumatic control system is essential for driving the soft pneumatic actuators. However, the conventional pneumatic control system tends to be big and heavy. Therefore, we have suggested the compact and light-weight pressure control system, which is based on the electrolysis/synthesis of water using a polymer electrolyte fuel cell (PEFC). If this technique is applied to the soft pneumatic actuator, it could be widely used as the portable devices. Previously, we applied this principle to the real soft pneumatic actuator. However, the conventional PEFC is hard and it disturbs the flexible motion of the soft actuator. In this paper, we solved this problem to use the developed soft PEFC whose electrode structure is same as an ionic polymer metal composite (IPMC) actuator which is also known as a soft actuator.