Research on Variable Stiffness and Damping Magnetorheological Actuator for Robot Joint

摘要

Aiming at the limitation of the traditional flexible robot's single adjustment stiffness or damping, a magnetorheological (MR) actuator of which stiffness and damping can be adjusted simultaneously and independently is proposed for the robot joint. The principle of equivalent variable stiffness and damping is analyzed theoretically, and the adjustment range of stiffness and damping is deduced. As the first step, the performance of variable damping is evaluated with experiment by using a MR damper. The preliminary results show that the magnetorheological actuator is capable of changing the damping by controlling the current applied to the damper.