• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.1296-1301
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• 2012

This paper deals with development of the driving-will control system in power-assisted electric wheelchair. Nowadays, population of elderly people has been increased rapidly, and also an electric wheelchair has been considered as the device for the elderly. Especially, power-assisted electric wheelchair can overcome problems that a conventional electric wheelchair holds, such as lack of movement of wheelchair user. In this paper, we propose the sensors system to measure the driving-will force and perform the control action for a power-assisted electric wheelchair. And motion performance of the proposed system is verified through the experiment.

• 제어로봇시스템학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2003.10a
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• pp.1509-1512
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• 2003

The electric power wheelchair needs to control motor torque and speed for responding to variable actions given by handling a joystick. In this paper a DSP-based BLDC motor controller using a single dc-link current sensor is presented for electric power wheelchair. It is composed by a DSP processor and three-phase inverter module. To control torque, high speed current control is achieved by the PI controller and pulse width modulation (PWM) signals with 25 kHz carrier frequency, which is performed by 200 ${\mu}sec$ cycle. The speed controller computes the new direct current reference from the speed error and the PI control equation. The displacement value by handling the joystick is converted to reference speeds of right and left wheel motors using nonholonomic wheelchair kinematics. Experimental results show that the presented control system is enough to implement a speed servo in wheelchair driving.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.28 no.11
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• pp.1265-1271
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• 2011

These days the number of aged and disabled people is increasing rapidly. But most of the disabled or the aged who have the ability to work, want to engage in economic activities and solve social restrictions as well as their bad financial conditions. This paper concerns about the tracking control of an electric wheelchair robot for welfare vehicle where the seat and electric wheelchair are separated and electric wheelchair robot must be autonomously controlled without the help of assistant. So the aged or the disabled people can drive welfare vehicle by himself by adopting this system. Therefore the concept of both an autonomous driving of electric wheelchair and path tracking robots is required in this system. Finally we suggested fuzzy controller in order to control the path tracking of electric wheelchair robot and compared the capability of the proposed controller with conventional PID controller.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.22 no.7
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• pp.552-556
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• 2016

Obstacle detection is a key feature in the safe driving control of electric wheelchairs. The suggested obstacle detection algorithm was designed to provide obstacle avoidance direction and detect the existence of cliffs. By means of this information, the wheelchair can determine where to steer and whether to stop or go. A 3D depth camera (Microsoft KINECT) is used to scan the 3D point data of the scene, extract information on obstacles, and produce a steering direction for obstacle avoidance. To be specific, ground detection is applied to extract the obstacle candidates from the scanned data and the candidates are projected onto a 2D map. The 2D map provides discretized information of the extracted obstacles to decide on the avoidance direction (left or right) of the wheelchair. As an additional function, cliff detection is developed. By defining the "cliffband," the ratio of the predefined band area and the detected area within the band area, the cliff detection algorithm can decide if a cliff is in front of the wheelchair. Vehicle tests were carried out by applying the algorithm to the electric wheelchair. Additionally, detailed functions of obstacle detection, such as providing avoidance direction and detecting the existence of cliffs, were demonstrated.

• Journal of Digital Contents Society
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• v.19 no.8
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• pp.1507-1514
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• 2018

The purpose of this study was to propose a functional improvement solution of integrated control board for safe driving of Smart electric wheelchair for a single person. In the case of existing electric wheelchair products in Korea and elsewhere, safety-related functions or devices are not included in many cases. Therefore, the incidence of electric wheelchair-related accidents is continuously increasing in the current situation in which the elderly and the disabled people have been continuously increased. However, currently only high and middle-priced products are equipped with basic safety devices in electric wheelchairs, so low-priced products require safety related functions. Therefore, sensing obstacles that the user can not recognize while moving an electric wheelchair and detecting automatically the terrain change to control the motor by developing a smart control platform. This provides an integrated control board that can be applied to various electric wheelchairs for more stable driving.

• Smart Media Journal
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.17-25
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• 2015

In this paper proposes an idea for using NFC(Near Field Communication) on smalt mobile devices, you can easily control the electric wheelchair system. In this system with previous researches controlled a power wheelchair in a mobile device using Bluetooth communication, the board communicates with the integrated control of the wheelchair. With smart mobile devices, the wheelchair control board integrating the signal generated by checking real time so that the user can easily monitor the state of the wheelchair. Users are using smalt mobile devices, the wheelchair can be controlled easily, and the setting at any time according to the state of the individual and can be used. HEX format control is directly in hardware, allowing analysis was read, the user settings are typically used to match cards which support NFC technology such as bus card for registration, storing the selected information and enable read and were applicable. By applying this system, wheelchairs oriented aids disabled and older people able to access to provide with stability.

• Journal of Digital Contents Society
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.355-363
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• 2015

In this paper, we propose a system for controlling the seat of the electric wheelchair depending on the slope of the terrain in real time by using the ATmega smart control based on the board. Smart control board includes a gyro sensor, an acceleration sensor and Tilt sensor, when the electric wheelchairs pass slope of the terrain, they use three sensors to identify terrain configuration in real time. We also applied the Complementary Filter in the gyro sensor and acceleration sensor, so the electric wheelchairs know the exact terrain by solving the interference during the movement. Based on this, the noise power wheelchair due to the movement will be reduced, the seat continues reliably movement without being vibration. In this paper, providing an application on the smart phone platform for the convenience of users who are not familiar with how to use electric wheelchairs, they can easily control wheelchairs. Control platform of the smart phone is able to monitor the electric wheelchair in real-time, with regard to pressure prevention, help the slope of the seat to be arbitrarily controlled.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.798-804
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• 2016

This paper proposes a new operation and control strategy for Power-Assisted Wheelchairs (PAW) using one brushless DC (BLDC) motor. The conventional electrical wheelchairs are too heavy and large for one person to move because they have two electric motor wheels. On the other hand, the proposed PAW system has a small volume and is easy to move due to the presence of a single wheel motor. Unlike the conventional electric wheelchairs, this structure for a PAW does not have a control joystick to reduce its weight and volume. To control the wheelchair without a joystick, a special control system and algorithm are needed for proper operation of the wheelchair. In the proposed PAW system uses only one sensor to detect the acceleration and direction of PAW's movement. By using this sensor, speed control can be achieved. With a speed control system, there are three kinds of operations that can be done on the speed of a PAW: the increment of PAW speed by summing external force, the decrement of PAW speed by subtracting external force, and emergency breaking by evaluating the time duration of external force. The validity of the proposed algorithm is verified through experimental results.

• 제어로봇시스템학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2001.10a
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• pp.89.4-89
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• 2001

We propose an electric wheelchair that is suitable for the upper-limbs disabled with sufficient operability and low expenses. Features of this wheelchair, 1) By instating a simple mechanical module, existing electric wheelchairs can be readily converted to a special version for the upper-limbs disabled. 2) The electric wheelchair can be freely operated by motion of a head. 3) A vision system to assure safety operation by the disabled is introduced.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.14 no.11
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• pp.5392-5395
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• 2013

Application of electric wheelchair, sort of wheelchair which is playing important role in transporting patients and old people, has been increasing. In this study, we designed the electric wheelchairs' driving system. Using the multi-step gear, the driving system can get great power, even though the small capacity of motors. First, we designed the multi-step gear, test its bending strength and contact strength, as well as verified its performance. We installed 'B-type electric brake(Multiple plate clutch, Anti-magnetization) in same axle of the driving system, so it is possible to stop under huge torque and small size. Using this driving system of the multi-step gear which we designed, it's possible to improve driving gear efficiency 30% up and create the high-competitive electric wheelchair. And, it is easy to repair and control.