Fundamental investigation of an inflatable-reel actuator that can extend and contract

Abstract

Actuators are extremely important components for robots. In these days, not only conventional rigid actuators, but also various soft actuators have been developed, and they have provided robots to with capabilities never before possible. In this paper, we proposed a novel pneumatic soft actuator that can extend and contract with large deformation. It is composed of an inflatable tube and a spool mechanism. It is able to generate force in both extending and contracting motion. We confirmed that the extending force does not depend on the tube length, but inner pressure, and the contracting force increased as the extended tube length increases.