Suboptimal suit fit is a known risk factor for crewmember shoulder injury. Suit fit assessment is however prohibitively time consuming and cannot be generalized across wide variations of body shapes and poses. In this work, we have developed a new design tool based on the statistical analysis of body-shape scans. This tool is aimed at predicting the skin deformation and shape variations for any body size and shoulder pose for a target population. This new process, when incorporated with CAD software, will enable virtual suit fit assessments, predictively quantifying the contact volume, and clearance between the suit and body surface at reduced time and cost.
The objective of this study was to develop and deploy a novel motion capture system that utilizes off-the-shelf, dive-rated hardware to measure 3-D whole body reach envelopes of space suits in an underwater analog, which simulates a microgravity environment. The accuracy of the developed system was compared to a gold standard motion capture system in a dry-land condition before deployment. This study is ultimately aimed at providing a methodology for quantitative metrics to evaluate and compare the mobility performances of a newly developed prototype space suit versus an existing space suit at the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory (NBL) at NASA’s Johnson Space Center.
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