Development of a Highly Maneuverable Walking Aid

Abstract

Walking aids are vehicles that need to carry a major part of the user's weight and to run on roads. Therefore, automotive engineering was applied in this study to improve the walking aid design. The walking aid developed can turn in a small space such as in an elevator, ride over gaps such as curbs, and keep straight trajectories on rough and slanted surfaces with minimum user effort. The core part of this design lies in the adoption of a multi-functional swing-arm suspension for the front caster wheels and direct yaw-moment control by the rear-wheel motor drives.