Optimal Design of a Cable Driven Parallel Robot for Upper Limb Rehabilitations

Abstract

Abstract A novel cable driven parallel robot is introduced to assist upper limb in rehabilitation treatments in this paper, which has a lightweight structure. This robot is characterized by a novel and flexible end-effector that is easy to change assembly for different therapies. And it is designed for desktop usage, so its size is not too large. After presenting the structure, the kinematic model is presented for optimal design. Then, the minimal singular value is considered as the velocity transmission index. For upper limb rehabilitation, a new optimal design problem with the transmission index and the robot size is formulated. Last, the optimization presents a design with satisfying performances in velocity transmission capability and robot size.