Print Email Facebook Twitter A novel self-aligning mechanism to decouple force and torques for a planar exoskeleton joint Title A novel self-aligning mechanism to decouple force and torques for a planar exoskeleton joint Author Schorsch, J.F. Keemink, A.Q.L. Stienen, A.H.A. Van der Helm, F.C.T. Abbink, D.A. Faculty Mechanical, Maritime and Materials Engineering Department Biomechanical Engineering Date 2014-08-06 Abstract The design of exoskeletons is a popular and promising area of research both for restoring lost function and rehabilitation, and for augmentation in military and industrial applications. A major practical challenge to the comfort and usability for exoskeletons is the need to avoid misalignment of the exoskeletal joint with the underlying human joint. Alignment mismatches are difficult to prevent due to large inter-user variability, and can create large stresses on the attachment system and underlying human anatomy. Previous self-aligning systems have been proposed in literature, which can compensate for muscle forces, but leave large residual forces passed directly to the skeletal system. In this paper we propose a new mechanism to reduce misalignment complications. A decoupling approach is proposed which allows large forces to be carried by the exoskeletal system while allowing both the muscle and skeletal joint force presented to the user to be compensated to any desired degree. Subject OA-Fund TU Delft To reference this document use: http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:faeb5c70-1b7d-460f-b73f-6685df296a11 DOI https://doi.org/10.5194/ms-5-29-2014 Publisher Copernicus Publications ISSN 2191-916X Source http://www.mech-sci.net/5/29/2014/ Source Mechanical Sciences, 5 (2), 2014 Part of collection Institutional Repository Document type journal article Rights © 2014 The Author(s)CC Attribution 3.0 License. Files PDF ms-5-29-2014.pdf 884.97 KB Close viewer /islandora/object/uuid%3Afaeb5c70-1b7d-460f-b73f-6685df296a11/datastream/OBJ/view