Development of Negative-Pressure Artificial Muscles With Fiber Constraints and Pre-Stretched Soft Skin
Tao Wang, Jiawei Zhu, Fei Li, Xi Wang, Guoqiang Fu, Caijiang Lu
Abstract
Negative-pressure artificial muscles based on internal support and flexible skin provide a way to develop high-performance artificial muscles. However, the random and disordered skin wrinkles formed during the contraction may lead to uncertainty in the actuation behavior, and the flexible but inextensible skin weakens the elasticity and passive deformability of these artificial muscles. In this work, a new type of negative-pressure artificial muscle is developed by combining circumferentially pre-stretched soft skin and axial fiber constraints. The design concept of the artificial muscle has been demonstrated by comparison with the current design. Introducing pre-stretch can eliminate wrinkles and provide passive deformability during actuation process, which is verified through experiments. The fibers are employed to provide deformation constraints, allowing the artificial muscle to maintain a large output force and strain. The effect of pre-stretch in the soft skin on the passive and active deformation behavior of the artificial muscle has been experimentally investigated, and its application prospects are illustrated by moving an elbow joint and a soft crawling robot. This work offers a method for designing negative-pressure artificial muscles without skin wrinkles, and will provide more inspiration to the robotics community.
BibTeX
@inproceedings{ral2024_developmentofneg,
title = {Development of Negative-Pressure Artificial Muscles With Fiber Constraints and Pre-Stretched Soft Skin},
author = {Tao Wang and Jiawei Zhu and Fei Li and Xi Wang and Guoqiang Fu and Caijiang Lu},
booktitle = {RA-L 2024},
year = {2024}
}