Pneumatic muscle and hyperelastic rod combined continuum snakelike arm

Abstract

The invention discloses a pneumatic muscle and hyperelastic rod combined continuum snake-shaped arm which comprises a plurality of sections of variable stiffness drivers which are detachably connected into a whole. The variable stiffness driver comprises a soft body end plate, a soft body pneumatic unit, a hyperelastic rod mechanism, a limiting triangular end plate and a connecting sleeve; the hyperelastic rod mechanism comprises three hyperelastic control rods and a middle main rod. The four hyperelastic rods penetrate through the soft pneumatic unit from one ends of the drivers and extend to the corresponding drivers. The soft pneumatic unit and the two soft end plates are bonded together through hot glue. The limiting triangular end plates are installed at the two ends of the soft pneumatic unit and sealed through the soft end covers. The connecting sleeve is used for connecting the two drivers through a gap buckle of the soft body end cover; every two adjacent drivers can be detached through the corresponding sleeve. The soft pneumatic units and the hyperelastic rods form opposite-direction force effects, and rigidity change control over the snakelike arm is achieved.

Description

technical field [0001] The invention relates to a mechanical arm, in particular to a continuum serpentine arm combined with pneumatic muscles and superelastic rods. Background technique [0002] Due to limited flexibility, poor safety and adaptability, traditional robots face great challenges in some special applications, such as medical surgery, human-computer interaction, and engine internal search and detection. The emergence and development of soft robot technology provides new ideas for solving the problems of safety and compliance in traditional robots. But so far, research on soft robots is still in its infancy, and there is a certain gap between its output performance (such as output force and positioning accuracy) and traditional robots and application requirements. [0003] However, the output force and stiffness of current soft manipulators are affected by soft materials, driving methods and structural forms, which limits their ability to work in special environm...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

However, due to the above-mentioned variable stiffness software snake-shaped arm, due to the use of pure soft or rigid-flexible design with flexible materials as the main body, the accuracy of its end is low, and there is a certain gap between the output accuracy and the application requirements.

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