Upper limb power-assist wearable robot for handling repetitive medium- to low-weight loads in daily logistics tasks

Abstract

In this study, we developed an upper-limb power-assisted wearable robot designed to reduce the burden of handling repetitive medium- to low-weight loads for daily logistics workers, thereby enhancing their work efficiency and overall safety. This study proposes a practical wearable robot with a well-designed structure for effectively supporting pick-and-place tasks at waist-to-shoulder height by applying a vertical force directly to the wearer’s wrist. The proposed robot features two active joints that are minimal for vertical assistance, resulting in a lightweight and compact structure. It offers six degrees of freedom per arm, including four passive joints, allowing free end-effector movement. Designed to connect only to the wearer’s wrist, the robot’s linkage is positioned along the wearer’s arm, not requiring alignment with the human–robot joint center, making it easy to wear and having a simple structure. This paper presents a method for calculating the joint torque that accounts for the deformation of the robot’s lightweight and slim links. This approach enhances the gravity compensation accuracy, and the proposed method demonstrates a lower RMS error compared to calculations based on the statics of the rigid link model. Experimental results demonstrated that the robot allowed for a wide range of motion and consistently applied an assistive force of 2 kgf per arm, facilitating the handling of objects weighing several kilograms.