Mechanical design and implementation of advanced control algorithms of a variable parametered strengthening lower-extremity exoskeleton

Even though robots have been used for many years in industry, they have been used in order to support human movements as a result of technological developments. In this thesis study, a sub-limb strengthening robot was designed in order to reduce the fatigue levels of healthy people and to increase the load carrying capacities, the prototype production was performed and the performance of the control methods applied by the experimental study was evaluated. This thesis consists of mathematical modelling of robot and human leg, simulation studies for different control methods, mechanical and electronic design of experimental setup, applying different control methods and parametric changes to experimental setup and getting and comparing the results. In the scope of the thesis, a mathematical model which is not encountered in the literature has been created and used in the simulation studies. As a result of the equations of motion solved with MATLAB, it has been observed that the robot has successfully tracked the leg movements. After the necessary mechanical and electronic designs for prototype production were carried out, the experimental setup was produced. Each control method, modeled with MATLAB / Simulink, has been applied to the system. In addition, the parameters of the system have been changed with the aim of revealing 5 different situations. In these different cases, each control method was applied separately and experimental results were obtained. The performances of the controllers were evaluated by comparing these results.