Design, Analysis and Experimental Study of a Cable-driven Parallel Waist Rehabilitation Robot

Abstract

The supply of traditional rehabilitation equipments cannot satisfy the need of more and more waist injury patients. A new cable-driven parallel waist rehabilitation robot (CPWRR) is designed to help the patients recover movement ability of the waist. The robot, consisting of a cable-driven parallel platform, a lower extremity exoskeleton and a fixing device of the upper limb, could perform some rehabilitation training of the lumbar 3-DOF rotation. Considering the coupling motion between the lower extremity and motion platform, the kinematic model is set up by introducing two set of coordinate system when the mechanical analysis of the CPWRR is carried on. By using the Lagrange’s equation, the dynamic model is established. The trajectory planning of the waist is performed illustrated by the case of the rehabilitation training of waist rotation. Then numerical simulation is carried on. And the laboratorial platform of the CPWRR is also built to do some rehabilitation training. The contrast experiment results show that the numerical simulation of the cable length and force basically coincide with the experimental data and the actual motion trajectory of the waist is almost identical to the predetermined. This work has a reference value for flexible intelligent medical rehabilitation devices and proves that the CPWRR could achieve the waist rehabilitation training and is promising waist rehabilitation devices.