Design of a haptic walker system based on cable driven actuator for lower limb rehabilitation

Abstract

In recent years, several robotic devices have been developed for lower limb rehabilitation. However, the post-training functional improvements in gait abilities after using those devices are reported to be either similar to conventional rehabilitation therapy or even lower in some cases. Meanwhile, those existing devices have several drawbacks such as heavy, complex mechanisms, expensive, restriction of mobility. Thus, this paper suggests a system which can help to realize lower limb joint torque on real ground without restriction of mobility. A walker combined with wire driven actuation of lower limb is proposed. The advantages of the proposed system are that the system is lightweight, easy to wear, can be implemented with simplistic control scheme and provides walking experience on the actual ground. In this paper, we have presented the design of the proposed device and performed analysis of its dynamics by using ADAMS® to assess its actuation. In future work the optimization of the design and fabrication of the system will be carried out.