Design and Robust Control of a 2 DOFs Lower
Limb Exoskeleton
Mohamed Ghezal, Mohamed Guiatni, Ismail Boussioud, Cherif Sofiane Renane
Complex Systems Control & Simulators Laboratory
Ecole Militaire Polytechnique
Algiers, Algeria
Abstract—For the past few decades, robotic exoskeletons have
been the subject of extensive research in research laboratories.
The level of performance and reliability of these systems has
steadily increased. Today, these applications involve neuromotor
rehabilitation and, more marginally, support for patients suf-
fering from motor impairments. In this context, we designed
and built a motorized exoskeleton with two degrees of freedom
for the functional support of the lower limbs. The design was
developed taking into account the different constraints related to
the anatomy of the human being lower limb and the kinematic-
static compatibility and the transparency of the structure. Elastic
actuators, which combine deformable elements and conventional
DC motors have been produced and associated with the me-
chanical structure. The electronic part was also developed to
instrument and control the joints of the exoskeleton. After the
modeling, we have synthesized and implemented several control
approaches, namely PID and Twisting second order sliding mode.
The results obtained showed the capacity of the exoskeleton to
perform walking cycles and its robustness with regard to external
disturbances.
Index Terms—Lower limb exoskeleton, Rotary Series Elastic
actuator, Robust control, Mechatronics design, Motion control,
Twisting Algorithm.
I. I NTRODUCTION
Aging of populations, weakness of elderly people, stroke
and locomotion system diseases make necessary the devel-
opment of wearable robots to improve the quality of life of
people.
An exoskeleton is a wearable robot that complements or
replaces a human body limb function [1]. Wearable robots can
be classified, according to the task they fulfill in coordination
with human limbs, into three classes [1] :
• Amplification exoskeletons : amplification is meant to
give a human with low physical characteristics, abilities
that he doesn’t have without the exoskeleton. Many
amplification exoskeletons have already been brought to
an end purchased such as the BLEEX [2] and the HAL
[3].
• Orthotic exoskeletons : these are mechatronic devices
used in the stabilization, restoration and reenforcement
of human limb motion for people with reduced mobility
[4].
• Prosthetic exoskeletons : these devices are used to replace
the whole human limb of amputees to restore the motion
dynamics using inertial or electromyographic sensors.
978-1-7281-0112-5/18/$31.00 ©2018 IEEE
A lower limb exoskeleton is a wearable robot that physically
assists disabled people to regain their normal daily activity
such as walking, standing up, sitting or climbing stairs.
A state-of-the-art recent and a survey and on lower limb
exoskeletons for different applications is compiled in [5] in
which more than 80 references and 46 devices have been
compared, in a holistic manner, in terms of end-users and also
through different parameters such as cost, safety, number of
degrees of freedom (DOF), control, sensors, materials, joint
mechanisms and battery details. The majority of the presented
devices are achieved and are commercialized. Thus, their
usefulness in the real life is actually is limited due to some
social and technical issues. Among the technical limitations
we have the complex sensing and actuation technology, weight
constraints of the structure, the slow response of the exoskele-
tons dynamic compared to humans, the energy autonomy when
used outdoors and comfort issues for wearability. The social
issues concern mainly the hesitation against the use of new
assistive technology and the high costs and poor human-
exoskeleton interactivity [6]. This statement shows that there
is still need for efficiency improvement and cost reduction of
these devices in order to make this technology accessible.
In applications where human is interacting with robots,
special consideration must be respected such as the user safety,
the compliance of the robot joints, energy saving and the
impedance of the actuators.
This work aims to propose a new exoskeleton for the lower
limb rehabilitation which mirrors the skeletal structure of pa-
tients lower limb. The use of exoskeleton-based rehabilitation
allows for independent and concurrent control of particular
movement of patients lower limb (fig. 1) in the three joints
(hip, knee and ankle). In order to avoid patient injury, it will
be necessary to take care in our device in adjusting lengths of
segments of the exoskeleton to the lengths of the segments of
the patient’s limb.
In this paper, we have designed a 2 DOFs lower limb
exoskeleton actuated using compliant series elastic actuator.
A control scheme based on dynamic modeling and PID
controller and a robust second order sliding mode controller
are developed and implemented. In section II, an overview of
the mechanical design of the exoskeleton and the compliant
elastic actuator is given. Section III, IV and V describes the
modeling, identification and control respectively. The exper-
imental results are presented and discussed in section VI.
Finally, in section VII, we give a conclusion about the present
work results.
Fig. 1. Lower limb joints description.
II. D ESIGN OF THE EXOSKELETON
A. Exoskeleton mechanical structure
The designed exoskeleton is intended to the functional
assistance of lower limbs. Its motion is simplified to be only
in the sagittal plane. Thus, the ball joints are replaced by
cylindrical joints. The adopted structure ad the Computer
Aided Design (CAD) model of the designed exoskeleton is
shown in Fig 2.
Fig. 2. CAD model of the exoskeleton
Many constraints are taken into account in the design of the
exoskeleton:
• The weight/power ratio must be optimized in order to
make a light weight exoskeleton which guarantees a
sufficient assistance.
• the structure of the exoskeleton must be made of a
material that resists to different applied forces.
• Friction, interaction between partsand inertia must be
minimized to improve the transparency of the exoskele-
ton.
• The exoskeleton must have an ergonomic structure and
its actuators must be compliant.
• since the security of the wearer is very important in
the design of the exoskeleton, hardware and software
constraints will be implemented.
The selection of actuators, torque amplification and move-
ment transmission mechanism must take into account a trade-
offs between the required power, weight and volume. We
have used the MotionWorks plug-in of Solidworks in order
to calculate the required performances of the actuators.
B. Design of the elastic actuator
Elastic actuators are used in the exoskeleton design for their
compliance. They consist of motors combined with springs.
The selection of electric motors among other actuators is based
on the facility of control and maintenance. A torsion spring
is integrated between the motor and the transmission chain.
It is intended to store the force applied by human joint and
diminish the transmitted torque to the actuator. Table I gives
the main characteristics of the torsional spring [7].
A rotary series elastic actuator (RSEA) [8] offers a mechan-
ical protection against clash thanks to the elastic element in
series between the motor and the structure of the actuator. By
measuring the deflection of the spring, it is possible to deter-
mine the actuator’s torque. Figure 3 represents thekinematic
scheme of the designed elastic actuator.
The design of the actuator and the definition of its required
specification is based on human joint properties. In [7], a study
was carried out to find the relationship between the torque
of the knee joint and the angular speed produced during a
step of normal gait. We consider a 70 kg body weight male
subject which need a 80 Watts power to make the knee joint
movement [9]. Maxon RE40 brushed DC motors are selected.
These actuators are suitable for this kind of devices since they
have a low friction and low inertia,
In our design, light materials were used in order to minimize
the weight and the stiffness of the linkages and stainless steel
ball bearings were used in order to overcome joint backlash
and friction (see fig. 4).
TABLE I
C HARACTERISTICS OF THE TORSIONAL SPRING .
Characteristics Values
Max deflection ±5.24 rad. (±300 deg.)
Max torque ±1.67 Nm.
Mean diameter 18 mm.
Wire diameter 1.50 mm.
Number of turns 9
Spring constant 0.30 Nm/rad.
III. E XOSKELETON M ODELING
A. Kinematic model of the exoskeleton
The kinematic model describes the relationship between
the spatial and articular coordinates. The kinematics of the
designed exoskeleton is described in fig 5.
 TABLE II
T HE E XOSKELETON MDH PARAMETERS .

j δ αj dj θj rj
1 0 0 0 θ1 0
2 0 0 l1 θ2 0
E / 0 l2 0 0

⎛ ⎞
C12 −S12 0 L1 C1 + L2 C12
Fig. 3. Kinematic scheme of the designed elastic actuator. ⎜ S12 C12 0 L1 S1 + L2 S12 ⎟
0
TE = ⎜
⎝ 0
⎟
⎠
0 1 0
0 0 0 1
with : S1 = sin(θ1 ), C1 = cos(θ1 ), C12 = cos(θ1 + θ2 ),
S12 = sin(θ1 + θ2 )
Finally, the generalized coordinates [Px Py ] are given as
follows :

Px = L1 C1 + L2 C12
(1)
Py = L1 S1 + L2 S12

B. Inverse Kinematics of the Exoskeleton

Fig. 4. Designed elastic actuator.
The inverse kinematic model gives the joint angles vector
from the spatial coordinate. It consists of solving equation (1)
The direct kinematic model is obtained using the modified to find θ1 and θ2 . Multiple solutions can be found. In the
Denavit-Hardenberg (MDH) parameters’ method [10] and the present case, the solution is as follows:
transformation matrix between frame Ri−1 (xi−1 , yi−1 , zi−1 )
and frame Ri (xi , yi , zi ), i.e. ⎧ √ 
⎛ ⎞ ⎪
⎪ −B ± B 2 + A2 − C 2
⎪
⎨ θ1 = arctan2
cosθi −sinθi 0 di C −A
⎜cosαi sinθi cosαi cosθi −sinαi −ri sinαi ⎟   (2)
i−1
Ti = ⎜ ⎟ ⎪
⎪ Py − l 1 S 1 P x − l 1 C 1
⎝sinαi sinθi sinαi cosθi cosαi ri cosαi ⎠ ⎪
⎩ θ2 = −θ1 + arctan2 ,
0 0 0 1 l2 l2

with : with : A = 2l1 Py , B = 2l1 Px , C = l22 − l12 − Px2 − Py2

αi : angle between zi−1 and zi around xi−1 .
di : distance between zi−1 and zi along xi−1 . C. Dynamic Model of the Exoskeleton
θi : angle between xi−1 and xi around zi . In order to study the behavior of the exoskeleton, it is neces-
ri : distance between xi−1 and xi along zi . sary to establish its dynamic model. It consists of mathematical
The kinematic description of the exoskeleton, assumed to equations combining positions, velocities and accelerations to
be a two degrees of freedom (2 dof) open chain serial robot, determine the torques applied by the actuators to generate the
is given in Fig.5. The MDH parameters are given in Table II: motion. Several methods are used to calculate the dynamic
The total transformation matrix is : model but the Lagrange equations method is more suited to
describe dynamic model of open chain serial robots [10].
The Lagrange equation is :
 
d ∂L ∂L
Γi = − (3)
dt ∂ θ̇i ∂θi

with θi and Γi are the ith joint angle and torque respectively.
L is the Lagrangian function :

L = Ke − K p (4)

where Ke and Kp are the kinetic and potential energies of

the whole system (human limb + exoskeleton). Ke and Kp
Fig. 5. Kinematic model of the exoskeleton. can be calculated using the following equations :
  
• G
m1 = −  m21 + m2 + k1 mcui + mjam gl1 s1 −
   2 +m
1

1 2 1 1 2 1 jam k2 gl2 s12 

Ke = l1 m1 + m2 l2 + l12 + l1 l2 cos θ2 + msh • G2 = − m21 + mjam k2 gl2 s12
8 4 4 2
2  1 1 IV. I NSTRUMENTATION AND M ODEL I DENTIFICATION
l1 + l22 k22 + 2l1 l2 k2 cos θ2 + k12 l12 mth + (I1 + I2 + Ish
 2 2 A. Instrumentation and Control Electronics
 
1 1   1
+Ith ) θ̇1 + m2 l2 + msh l1 + l2 k2 + (I1 + Ish ) θ̇22
2 2 2 2 2 Two encoders from Maxon type HEDS 5540 are used
8 2 2 for each actuator. These encoders provide 500 pulsations
  
1 1 2 1   per revolution. Thus, the position measurement resolution is
+ l + l1 l2 cos θ2 m2 + msh l22 k22 + 2l1 l2 k2 cos θ2 computed by taking into account, the reduction ratio. In order
2 2 2 2
  to estimate the actuator’s torque using the torque constant of
the actuators, current sensors are also integrated (type LTS
+ (I2 + Ish ) θ̇1 θ̇2 (5)
15-NP).
We have used a low cost real-time control and measurement
m  board (Arduino Mega Control Board). OPA541 power ampli-
1
Kp = + m2 + k1 mth + msh gl1 cos θ1 fiers from Burr-Brown are used to design the power stages
2 m 
1 which may provide a current about 10 for RE40 motors (Fig.
+ + k2 msh gl2 cos (θ1 + θ2 ) (6)
2 6).
with : m1 , m2 , l1 , l2 are the mass and length of thigh
and shank segments of the exoskeleton respectively. mth , msh
: are the mass of thigh and shank of human limb. k1 , k2
are constants that indicate the position the center of mass
of thigh and shank segments respectively. I1 , I2 , Ith , Ish
are the moments of inertia of thigh and shank segments of
the exoskeleton and human limb respectively. g is the gravity
acceleration.
Finally, the dynamic model can be written as follows :

Γ = H(θ)θ̈ + B(θ, θ̇) + C(θ)θ̇2 + G(θ) + F (θ) (7)

Fig. 6. Instrumentation and control electronics
with : Γ : torque vector, H : inertia matrix, B : Coriolis
matrix, C : centrifugal coefficients matrix, G : gravity vector,
F : external forces and friction vector. They are computed as
B. Model identification
follows:
  The dynamic model parameters have been identified using
H11 H12 least square method. However, human lower limb parameters
H= (8)
H21 H22 are calculated using results in [12] and [13]. The dynamic
1 2 1
1 2 2
 model is assumed to be linear with respect to the parameters,
• H11 =
 8 l1 m1 + 4 m2 4l2 + l1 + l1 l2 cos2 +
1 2 2 2
2 mjam l1 + l2 k2 + 2l1 l2 k2 cos2 + 12 k12 l12 mcui + it can be written as follows:
1
2 (I1 + I2 + Icui + Ijam )
1 2 1 2 2 2 1 Γ = W (θ, θ̇, θ̈) · X + ρ
• H22 = 8 m2 l2 + 2 mjam l1 + l2 k2 + 2 (I2 + Ijam ) (12)
1 2 1
• H12 = H21 = 2 l2 + l1 l2 cos2 2 m2 +
2 2 
1 where Γ is the measured torque vector, X is the model
2 mjam l2 k2 + 2l1 l2 k2 cos2 + (I2 + Ijam )
  parameters to be identified, W is the observation matrix, ρ
B11 0 the measurement error vector. X can be estimated using least
B= (9)
0 0 square method by :
1 
• B112 = 2 m2 + mjam k2 l1 l2 s2
  X̂ = argX min  ρ = W + Γ (13)
0 C12
C= (10)
C21 0 with :
1 
• C12 = − 2 m2 + mjam k2 l1 l2 s2
1 
1
• C21 = 4 m2 + 2 mjam k2 l1 l2 s2 W + = (W T W )−1 W T (14)
 
G1 For a model given by equation (15), the identified parame-
G= (11)
G2 ters are shown in Table III.
 B. Twisting Algorithm Control
In order to achieve finite time stabilization of the state
Γ = a1 θ̈ + a2 θ̇θ + a3 θ̇ + a4 θ + a5 θ cos θ when exoskeleton in the case of external disturbance, we have
+ a6 θ̇ cos θ + a7 sin θ + a8 cos θ (15) designed a simplified 2nd order sliding mode (SOSM) control
namely the Twisting Algorithm proposed by Levant [14].
This controller is known to be robust against external
TABLE III disturbances and to be able to remove the chattering problem.
DYNAMIC MODEL IDENTIFIED PARAMETERS
The controlled system will achieve finite time stabilization and
a1 a2 a3 a4 the state will remain bounded around origin.
4.48 × 10−4 −0.021 −3.224 5.195 The SOSM Twisting algorithm is given as follows. Consider
a5 a6 a7 a8
5.002 2.512 −10.531 −2.622
a class of uncertain system given by:

Figure 7 shows the validation result obtained for the torque ẋ(1) = x(2) (17)
model. We observe that the model response is close to the ẋ(2) = ϕ(x, t) + γ(x, t)u(t) (18)
actual response. Figure 8 shows the validation result obtained s(t, x) = x(1) (19)
for the position model. A very interesting is obtained since
we observe that the model and the actual responses are very where x(t) represents the state variable, ϕ(x, t) and γ(x, t)
close. represent smooth uncertainty items, u(t) represents the control
input, and s(t, x) represents the defined sliding surface. It is
assumed that: |ϕ(x, t)|  C and 0<Km  γ  KM .
where C, Km , and KM are positive constants. The control
algorithm is then defined as follows:

uT = −r1 sgn(s) − r2 sgn(ṡ) (20)

Fig. 7. Torque model validation.
Fig. 8. Position model validation.
V. M OTION C ONTROL
A. PID Controller Implementation
A classical control scheme based on PID (Proportional,
Integral, Derivative) controller is used on the designed ex-
oskeleton actuator. this type of controller is widely chosen in
industrial processes because of its implementation ease and its
good performance. The control law is obtained from the error
between the reference and the measured signal as :
ki
u(p) = (kp + + kd p)e(p)
p
u(p) is the control law, kp , ki , kd are the PID parameters.
Consequeltly, in order to the reach finite-time convergence,
sufficient conditions are:
(r1 + r2 )Km − C > (r1 − r2 )KM − C, (r1 − r2 )Km >C.
(21)
C. Results and Discussion
The results shown in Fig. 9 and Fig. 10 are obtained for
the following set of gain parameters : Kp = 0.7, Ki = 0.35,
Kd = 0.01. Reference curve of Fig.9 uses the CGA (Clinical
Gait Analysis) data available in the literature [15]. The results
show a good reference tracking with an error less than 0.85
deg (RM S). The rise time is approximately 0.5 s which
is relatively acceptable for such applications. In terms of
robustness, a disturbance rejection test shows that the PID
controller is sensitive to external distubances.
Figures 11 and 12 present the results of the implementa-
tion of the twisting algorithm control technique for KM =
3.8, Km = 1.5, λ = 4. These results show excellent tracking
performances which overperform those obtained using the
PID controller. Figure 13 presents the result of the controller
robustness evaluation. Form this figure, we can observe that
the position remains stable even in the presence of external
disturbance (an external applied force).
VI. C ONCLUSION
For assistance purposes, an exoskeleton equipped with ro-
tary series elastic actuators has been designed and built. The
(16) diffent models of this later have been also derived considering
the Exoskeleton–Human coupling. The Twisting Algorithm
has been implemented experimentally and successfuly in order
 to control the position of the knee joint. The effectiveness of
controller has been verified by applying external disturbances.
The structure of the exoskeleton as well as the actuator are to
be improved in our future works. More improvements to the
control scheme taking into account the targeted application
conditions will be done.
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Fig. 12. Tracking error using SOSM-TA controller.

Fig. 13. Controller Robusteness test.