A self-aligning artificial knee mechanism with two degrees of freedom was presented aiming at the problem of human-robot system misalignment at the knee joint. The mechanism was driven by two motors to simulate the flexion and extension movements of the biological knee joint. A kinematic model of human-robot coupling was established to quantify the misalignment as the deviation of the swing angle and position of the mechanism’s connecting point from the reference point of the calf. A particle swarm optimization (PSO)-based end-matching method for human-robot systems was proposed in order to reduce deviations and optimize the parameter of the key component. The swing angle of the artificial knee joint approaches the knee flexion and extension angle in the process of the bandage point approaching the reference point. A group of high-speed cameras was used to measure the movement data of individual lower leg, and the human-robot matching operation was conducted with the results as a reference. A digital virtual prototype was developed to conduct simulation experiments. The matching effect of the artificial knee joint and individual calf motion was verified through a joint simulation of MATLAB-Adams. Results show that the artificial knee joint can achieve motion matching and self-alignment of the swing angle.
Fig.2Mechanical diagram of self-aligning artificial knee joint
Fig.3Detailed mechanism diagram of main transmission mechanism
Fig.4Human-robot system in initial state
Fig.5Kinematic sketch of main transmission mechanism
Fig.6Human-robot system in motion state
Fig.7Flow chart for optimally calculating gear ratio to match individual calf movement
Fig.8Calibration of collection points and collection process
Fig.9Motion trajectories of subjects A and B
Fig.10Human-robot matching results for subject A
Fig.11Human-robot matching results for subject B
杆名
杆长/mm
初始角度/rad
EA
l0 = 100
—
AB
l1 = 50
θ10 = π/3
BC
l2 = 50
θ20 = 2π/3
CD
l3 = 157
θ30 = ?π/3
Tab.1Design parameters for remaining components of artificial knee joint
Fig.12Virtual prototype of self-aligning artificial knee joint and control system
Fig.13Comparison of D-point and S-point trajectories of human-robot system
Fig.14Experimental results of human-robot matching based on virtual prototype
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