Technological progress has liberated most industrial personnel in developed nations from heavy lifting tasks. Such work remains largely unchanged, however, in the fields of agriculture, manufacturing, and construction, among others. Such tasks are an important issue due to their potential for triggering work-related musculoskeletal disorders. The use of the McKibben artificial muscle has opened the way to the introduction of “muscle suits” - compact, lightweight, reliable, wearable “assist-bots” enabling factory personnel to lift and carry weights greater than conventionally possible.
Because of the progress of technology, we have liberated from heavy tasks in a large sense. However, heavy tasks that are difficult to mechanically automate are still remained a lot in the field of agriculture, manufacture, construction, and so forth . These heavy tasks are big issue since they cause workrelated musculoskeletal disorders. Therefore, we developed Muscle Suit in order to solve this problem. Muscle Suit, wearable robot, provides a muscular support by wearing it on the laborers. The use of McKibben artificial muscle allows Muscle Suit to be lightweight, small enough, and reliable for practical use. In this paper, we have developed Muscle Suit for factory laborers and also examined the effects of Muscle Suit on lifting and holding tasks.
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