Development of a mobile assist device to support a walking for disabled children by a hybrid driving combining with pneumatic soft actuators and electrical motors

-2th Report: The prototype of changing a step mechanism by extremely lightweight soft actuators-

Abstract

According to survey by cabinet office, there are about seven thousand disabled children with lower limb in Japan and many of them cannot move by themselves. Early moving experience affect their later feelings and exercise capacity, so it is ought to early recover their walking ability. In previous researches, we developed a mobile assist device to support a walking for disabled children by a hybrid driving combining with pneumatic soft actuators and electrical motors. It can use everywhere for children who are difficult to undergo walking rehabilitation. As a result of trial ride with the device, we confirmed it is necessary to extend step that the device support and have capacity to support with various motion, for example route change. In this paper, we will describe about a mobile assist device with new traction mechanism which is capable of supporting longer step than former one and changing step mechanism.