Experimental comparisons between McKibben type artificial muscles and straight fibers type artificial muscles

Taro Nakamura

doi:10.1117/12.698845

5 January 2007 Experimental comparisons between McKibben type artificial muscles and straight fibers type artificial muscles

Taro Nakamura

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 6414, Smart Structures, Devices, and Systems III; 641426 (2007) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.698845
Event: SPIE Smart Materials, Nano- and Micro-Smart Systems, 2006, Adelaide, Australia

Abstract

This paper describes experimental comparison between a conventional McKibben type artificial muscle and a straight fibers type artificial muscle developed by the authors. A wearable device and a rehabilitation robot which assists a human muscle should have characteristics similar to those of human muscle. In addition, because the wearable device and the rehabilitation robot should be light, an actuator with a high power/weight ratio is needed. At present, the McKibben type is widely used as an artificial muscle, but in fact its physical model is highly nonlinear. Further, the heat and mechanical loss of this actuator are large because of the friction caused by the expansion and contraction of the sleeve. Therefore, the authors have developed an artificial muscle tube in which high strength glass fibers have been built into the tube made from natural latex rubber. As results, experimental results demonstrated that the developed artificial muscle is more effective regarding its fundamental characteristics than that of the McKibben type; the straight fibers types of artificial muscle have more contraction ratio and power, longer lifetime than the McKibben types. And it has almost same characteristics of human muscle for isotonic and isometric that evaluate it dynamically.

Citation Download Citation

Taro Nakamura "Experimental comparisons between McKibben type artificial muscles and straight fibers type artificial muscles", Proc. SPIE 6414, Smart Structures, Devices, and Systems III, 641426 (5 January 2007); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.698845

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