| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立高雄科技大學 === 機械工程系 === 107 === Many disabled people caused by accidents walk on crutches in daily lives. However, the commercially available crutches only provide such a simple function of mobile assistance, and therefore some improvement is possible. In this study, an electric telescopic rod embedded with a soft gripper is designed that extends the conventional one with additional ability of object capture. The soft gripper can capture the object robustly by more contact area. The geometric design of the grippers includes a linear type, a negative-curvature type, and a positive-curvature type. The finger number of the grippers is varied from 2 to 4. The major mechanical parts such as the rod and fingers are made by 3D printing to reduce development cost of with high complexity of design. The cost of the telescopic rod, which was 88 centimeters long with 523 grams of weight, was NT$2578. We use the microelectronic controller of Arduino Pro Mini to perform gripping objects by driving a stepper motor installed in the telescopic rod. One motion sensor and four tactile sensors mounted on the gripper are used for measurement of the gripping stability in action and motion. The performance for the grippers with different geometries and finger number are analyzed, compared, and discussed for optimal design. From the experimental results, Negative-curvature type clips have the smallest deflection, both within 5°, and the clamping force is the most stable. The negative-curvature type standard deviation was 1.37g among the three grippers, so the negative-curvature type was best for picking up items.
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