A novel customized Cable-driven robot for 3-DOF wrist and forearm motion training

Abstract

A low-cost and easy-to-customize Cable-driven Wrist Robotic Rehabilitor (CDWRR) has been developed for forearm and wrist motion training. This device can be potentially applied to rehabilitation of stroke patients for three degree-of-freedom (3-DOF) arm motion, including forearm supination/pronation, wrist flexion/extension and ulnar/radial deviation. The CDWRR can be customized for patients with different motor impairments of the wrist. With the cable-driven parallel structure, it has properties such as low-cost, low-weight, and easy-to-reconfigure. In this paper, the structural design, kinematic analysis, workspace calculations, and parameter identification algorithms are presented. Computer simulations of the identification algorithms are performed to validate the results. Finally, preliminary experiments on a healthy subject are carried out to demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed robot to provide assistance to the human wrist and forearm during movement training.