Mayuko Mori

Very High Force Hydraulic McKibben Artificial Muscle with a p-Phenylene-2,6-benzobisoxazole Cord Sleeve

Small and lightweight actuators that generate high force and high energy are strongly required for realizing powerful robots and tools. By applying ultra-high-strength p-phenylene-2,6-benzobisoxazole fiber sleeves to McKibben artificial muscles, new hydraulic artificial muscles have been developed. While conventional McKibben muscles are driven by a maximum pneumatic pressure of 0.7 MPa, the newly developed muscles are driven by a maximum water hydraulic of pressure of 4 MPa, resulting in very high force capability. This paper presents the materials and structure of the new artificial muscle and the experimental results. The developed muscles are evaluated by four parameters — force density per volume (FDV), force density per mass (FDM), energy density per volume (EDV) and energy density per mass (EDM) — for comparisons with other conventional linear actuators. The prototype artificial muscle, which is 40 mm in diameter and 700 mm in length, can achieve a maximum contracting force of 28 kN, FDV of 32.3 × 10–3 N/mm3, FDM of 9.44 × 103 N/kg, EDV of 2600 × 10–3 J/mm3 and EDM of 762 × 103 J/kg. These values are 1.7 to 33 times larger than those of the typical conventional actuators. As the result, a high force artificial muscle of 40 mm in diameter that generates 28-kN contracting force has been developed successfully.

A mobile jack robot for rescue operation

This paper reports a research and development of a rescue robot using a high-pressure hydraulic actuator. We developed a practical and simple rescue robot, which used a high-pressure hydraulic actuator which generates 100 kN force at 70 MPa to drive a mechanism of jack. The objective of the robot is to jack up debris to keep or to make space of moving courses for other rescue robots and rescue tools, and to rescue victims under debris. The robot jacks up to 33 kN load. We demonstrated that the robot can jack up over 20 kN to jack up a fallen tree of 20 kN.

Field test for verifying the capability of two high-powered hydraulic small robots for rescue operations

We developed rescue robots and tools that are driven by hydraulic actuators. They are small-sized, have simple mechanisms, and are suitable for heavy-duty rescue operations. This report shows the results of field tests carried out to verify the possibility of the two rescue robots we developed; we named them the Jack Robot and the Cutter Robot. We classified disaster situations into three categories: collapsed house cases, collapsed building rubble cases, and traffic accidents. We used the two robots in test situations that simulated these three disaster scenarios. As part of the experimental results, we found that there is a great potential for the use of these high-powered small rescue robots in disaster areas

Development of very high force hydraulic McKibben artificial muscle and its application to shape-adaptable power hand

By applying ultra high strength PBO fiber sleeves to McKibben artificial muscle, new hydraulic artificial muscles have been developed. While conventional McKibben muscles are driven by maximum pneumatic pressure of 0.7 MPa, the newly developed muscles are driven by water hydraulic of maximum pressure of 4 MPa, resulting in very high force capability. This paper shows the new artificial muscle, its performance and application to shape-adaptable power hand. The developed muscles were evaluated by four parameters, namely force density per volume (FDV), force density per mass (FDM), energy density per volume (EDV) and energy density per mass (EDM) for comparisons with other conventional linear actuators. The prototype artificial muscle, which is 40 mm in diameter and 700 mm in length can achieve the maximum contracting force of 28 kN, FDV of 32.3×10−3 N/mm3, FDM of 9.44×103 N/kg, EDV of 2600×10−3 J/mm3 and EDM of 762×103 J/kg. These values are 1.7 to 33 times larger than these of the typical conventional actuators. The developed muscles have been applied to a power hand which has shape adaptability to grasped objects. This hand can generate high force and grasp objects, which weighs about 230 kg both in horizontal and vertical direction.