ENGINEERING DESIGN PORTFOLIO

My senior capstone team was tasked with designing a soft-actuated exosuit that could help prevent lifting-induced back injuries. While this was left relatively open-ended, given the budget and time frame we decided to use pneumatic balloon actuators known as McKibben muscles. These were grouped into two banks: four along the longissimus muscles on the back, and four around the abdominal area to provide support.

​

The system is controlled by an Arduino, which takes input from and IMU to determine the start and end of a lift. The Arduino also reads pressure sensors to control the valves connected to the actuators. The air and power supplies are external.

​

I was tasked with:

• Designing and building the McKibben pneumatic muscles

• Overall design and construction

• Drawings and schematics

​

While we were not able to finish the prototype due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we finished designing and modeling the suit online and in CAD.