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Admit it, you have dreamed of wearing something like Tony Stark’s Iron Man suit. Sadly, that technology is fictional and real world exoskeleton suits are expensive. But a Swiss company called Auxivo wants to make exoskeletons available to educators, students, and hobbyists. To make that happen, they’re releasing their new EduExo Pro wearable robotic exoskeleton kit.

The EduExo Pro is available on Kickstarter to backers in a variety of packages, from a DIY version to a complete, assembled arm. Whichever option you choose, you will end up with a robotic exoskeleton arm that straps onto your own arm to enhance your strength. It has steel load-bearing structural parts and ball bearings on the joints. The shoulder joint has a heavy spring to provide assistance, while the elbow joint utilizes a powerful stepper motor.

An Arduino Uno board controls the stepper motor. It receives data from two sensors: a potentiometer to detect the elbow joint angle and an EMG (electromyography) sensor to monitor bicep muscle activity. The latter can detect when the wearer is flexing their bicep and then push power to the stepper motor. The arm also interacts with software running on a connected computer. For example, the EduExo Pro handbook provides instructions for integrating the arm with a Unity3D virtual reality game.

If you’re interested in trying the EduExo Pro for yourself, the Kickstarter campaign is running until July 29th.  

The post EduExo Pro is an Arduino-controlled robotic exoskeleton kit that’s now on Kickstarter appeared first on Arduino Blog.

Prosthetic and assistive technologies have come have come a long way in recent years. When there are not only major medical research organizations, but individuals getting on board designing tools to improve the lives of others? That’s something special. Enter a homebrew essay into this field: ExoArm.

Attached to the body via what was available — in this case, the support harness for a gas-powered weed-eater — which distributes the load across the upper body and an Arduino for a brain, ExoArm designer [Kristjan Berce] has since faced roadblocks with muscle sensors meant to enable more instinctive control. So — for now — functionality is limited to a simple up and down motion controlled by two switches. It is worth noting that the down switch is currently mounted in such a way that when the user moves their arm down, the ExoArm follows suit, so there is some natural feel to using the arm in its present iteration.

Developed with the elderly — and others who need a boost to physical strength to live a normal life — in mind, this prototype is able to curl up to 10kg in excess of its own weight. Presently, the only motor is on the elbow joint — granting a basic range of motion — with one adapted to the shoulder joint forthcoming! And, costing only $100, it’s a heck of a start.

We’ve featured some impressive individual forays into hackers helping others, humans and animals alike!


Filed under: Arduino Hacks, hardware

You’ve seen exoskeletons in movies such as Aliens and Iron Man, and perhaps even heard about current experiments with human use. Unfortunately though, if you want to learn about this technology, the barrier to entry is very high.

EduExo, now available on Kickstarter, is an attempt by robotics researcher Volker Bartenbach to bring this technology to the masses. Based on an Arduino Uno, the device takes the form of an upper and lower arm cuff, along with a motor and force sensor to allow it to be used for haptic control.

It’s available for you to 3D print and assemble yourself, or for a larger pledge, you can receive all the parts needed to build it. Interested? Check out Bartenbach’s campaign!

As hilariously outrageous as Pacific Rim was, it was still an awesome concept. Giant robot battle suits, duking it out with the aliens. Well, it looks as if it wasn’t quite as far-fetched as we first imagined. Maker [Danny Benedettelli] just released a video of his very own Lego exoskeleton suit that when worn can be used to control a desktop size Cyclops robot. You might remember [Danny] as the author of The Lego Mindstorms EV3 Library,

The Cyclops robot (also his design) was originally built four years ago using Lego Mindstorms NXT system with an Android phone running a custom app. Cyclops has been upgraded a bit for this demonstration. Now it communicates over Bluetooth with an Arduino to [Danny’s] telemetry suit.

Relatively speaking, the system is pretty simple. The Lego exoskeleton has potentiometers on each joint, which map to a degree of freedom for the robot. When one potentiometer spins, the associated robot joint mimics it. Simple, right?

He says it’s just a prototype, so we can probably expect an even more functional robot very soon — for more information, check out his personal site called Danny’s Lab.

[via Kotaku]


Filed under: Android Hacks, Arduino Hacks, robots hacks


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