Mechanical design procedures for series elastic actuators

This article presents the mechanical design procedures that were devised for the development of series elastic actuators (SEA), a type of actuators that enable joint level torque control of robots. These procedures include the synergistic combination of studies that were conducted via simulation and CAD software whose outcomes were experimentally verified, with a special emphasis on the torsional spring, the most crucial element in the unit. Technical difficulties and shortcomings that were encountered in the first version of the actuator are disclosed with the help of experimental data. The article is concluded with the results from the ready-to-use 2nd version of our SEA