Improvement in Straight-ahead Stability of Front Drive Type Electric Wheelchair Using Yaw-Rate Control

摘要

Electric-powered wheelchairs have been used as a convenient transport device for elderly and handicapped persons.Recently,a front drive type electric wheelchair that is easy for a handicapped person to get on from hed has been focused on.However,the front drive type wheelchair is hard to run straight not only on slope but also on flat floor because of its over-steering characteristic.If wheelchair can be driven by an easy control stick operation,it will be a comfortable function for handicapped persons.In our previous work,we proposed a new wheelchair control method which realizes comfortable functions,i.e.driving with same easy stick operation like the traditional rear drive type wheelchair.The proposed control system uses ideal model of electric wheelchairs.By using our proposed method,we can realize easy stick operation.In this paper,we evaluate the effectiveness of our proposed method by experiments with electric-powered wheelchair.In particular,straight-ahead stability is analyzed by human driving.