Research on Control Strategy for Waist-assisted Exoskeleton

In order to alleviate the muscle fatigue of industrial workers who undergo repeated, intensive waist motions, a waist-assisted exoskeleton control strategy is presented. Firstly, the assistance principle is introduced. Then, an overall control method for waist-assisted exoskeleton is proposed, in which the finite state machine algorithm is adopted to identify the human motion intention, and corresponding control strategies, where no assistance is provided in squatting state, a slightly smaller constant torque is given in maintaining state, a torque similar to the net joint torque curve is designed in the getting-up state, are put forward according to different needs in different phases of bending down to assist workers to lift up heavy objects, reduce muscle fatigue, and increase operation efficiency. The electromyogram test results showed that the exoskeleton can reduce the erector spinae muscle activity by a maximum of about 24.45%, and an average reduction of about 11.13%, showing a significant assistance effect.