Toward developing a power assist robot for lowering heavy objects: Analysis of human characteristics and object motions

Humans frequently need to lower heavy objects for various purposes. We assume that suitable human-robot systems such as power assist systems may be comfortably used to lower heavy objects/materials. However, most of the currently available power assist devices are designed for rehabilitation and health care purposes, and hence the development of suitable power assist devices for lowering heavy objects is not being considered by the researchers. Again, the power assist devices developed for lowering heavy objects cannot be human-friendly, safe, natural etc. if these are not designed considering human characteristics and the object's motion features. This paper suggests a set of design guidelines for designing human-friendly power assist robots for lowering heavy objects in various industries based on human characteristics and object's motion features. As a preliminary initiative, this paper reports the preliminary study results on weight perception, load forces and object motion features for lowering objects manually.