Development of an ankle exoskeleton system

• Main Author: Ong, Jun Peng
• Other Authors: Cheah Chien Chern
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2015
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering::Electrical and electronic engineering::Control and instrumentation::Control engineering
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/63764
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

In the recent decades, there have been more research and development (R & D) on exoskeletons. An exoskeleton is an external robotic suit, donned by the user, which can either increase the user’s speed or track the user’s motion while carrying an external load. Exoskeleton R & D has been gaining popularity due to its wide range of application and improvements in enabling technology (for e.g. improved energy density of batteries). One of the applications is in the military, where the exoskeleton is used primarily to enhance the speed of the soldier or improve their endurance by helping to support the load of the soldier. This project was initiated by the author himself and was done with the direct supervision of his supervisor, Assoc Prof. Cheah Chien Chern. The objective of the project is to develop an ankle exoskeleton which tracks the user’s ankle motion via sensing of the user’s intention through the measurement of the user’s heel contact force. This report discusses the process of developing the ankle exoskeleton from scratch, from the design of hardware to the testing and implementation of the controller. Key phases of the project are hardware phase, software and electronics phase and the controller design phase. The final ankle exoskeleton was able to track the user’s ankle motion while the user oscillates his ankle, up to a maximum speed of 0.714Hz without impeding the user’s motion.