Sliding-bar MACCEPA for a powered ankle prosthesis

This paper describes a new design that improves several as- pects of the Mechanically Adjustable Compliance and Con- trollable Equilibrium Position Actuator (MACCEPA). The proposed design avoids premature wear and attachment is- sues found in the cable transmission used in previous MAC- CEPA and allows the use of high-performance compact com- pression springs. The mechanical configuration of the actu- ator provides an adjustable stiffness with a nonlinear stiffen- ing output torque. The output position of the actuator and its global stiffness are independent from each other. In this work we provide a mathematical description of the actua- tion principle along with an experimental verification of its performance in a powered ankle-foot prosthesis. This work is part of the CYBERLEGs project funded by the European Commissions 7th Framework Programme.

Jaar van publicatie:2015

Trefwoorden:Prostheses, Actuators, Stiffness

CSS-citation score:2