Development of Series Spring Tendon Module Imitating Tendon Properties of Horses

Abstract

Quadrupeds can generate adaptive limb trajectories according to the locomotion speeds and road conditions. An essential factor in the adaptive locomotion of animals is flexibility of tendons. Animal tendons have a notable nonlinear property, where it responds with lower stiffness for relatively small displacement, and higher stiffness for larger displacement. In order to investigate the contribution of the tendon properties to the mechanism of limb trajectories generation, we develop a tendon module imitating the tendon properties of horses. This article describes the design of the proposed tendon module and evaluates its properties by measuring the F − L properties of the tendon module.