Rehabilitation robots are assistive devices designed for use by people with severe disability in order to gain independence in tasks of daily living. MANUS is a wheelchair-mounted general-purpose manipulator now in use with over 100 people in their homes in the Netherlands, in France and in other countries. MANUS has six main degrees of freedom, excluding the gripper. To keep the arm slim, the motors are placed in the main base. The resulting low mass of the arm ensures a reduced impulse in case of collision. A complex system of toothed belts, hollow shafts and geared wheels drives the end-effector. MANUS is equipped with a two-fingered gripper. The fingers have passive canting mechanisms which ensure a three-point grasping action for most objects. A modular control system is used for steering the manipulator to its desired position. For this, a simple but effective user interface has been developed which is configurable by the end-user as well as by the therapist.
The Manus manipulator is a wheelchair mounted assistive device for severely motor disabled persons. It is a six degrees of freedom rehabilitation robot (excluding external lift and gripper), the control of which can be improved, especially for users with very limited rest functionality. The approach presented in this paper combines autonomous vision based control with direct user control resulting in a collaborative controller. Results of preliminary user trials show that this technique allows severely disabled persons to manipulate objects more easily.
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