The graphical human robot interface for curb climbing wheelchair

Abstract

Wheelchairs as the commonly used manually operated or power-driven device designed for people who have a mobility disability for indoor or outdoor locomotion. Wheelchairs have developed into various formats to satisfy the users’ special needs and overcome different conditions of the surrounding environment. Most models of wheelchairs are developed to fit the needs of normal roads condition, which ignores the cases of unevenness on the road, for instance, the curb on the road. Therefore, a unique model focused on developing curb climbing can help address this issue. To optimize the existing prototype and provide a better user experience, the design of the new control algorithm and graphical human-robot interface were two keys in this dissertation. Therefore, to design a robotic wheelchair controlled by a human-robot interface, this dissertation first analyzed the existing prototype and found some potential improvements. Then, some literature in the field of robotic wheelchairs was reviewed to find out solutions for mechanical design, control algorithms, and human-robot interface design. Afterward, the review of selecting the mechatronic devices and their working principles were specifically described. With the aid of this, the further modification of this project, including improvement of the existing joystick mapping, development of the curb detection function, graphical human-robot interface, and upgraded algorithm clearly depicted. Experiments and user experience surveys were carried out to examine the effectiveness of the HRI collaborating with the upgraded prototype. Possible research work for further development was proposed in the end.