MODULAR DRIVEN WHEELCHAIR BOND GRAPH MODELLING

Bond Graphs (BG) have become popular and are largely employed nowadays as efficient graphical description of multi-domain dynamic systems. This modelling technique is used in this paper to study the dynamics of an ordinary Manual Propelled wheelchair (MPW) and a mechatronic drive module (MDM). This electric powered mechatronic drive module is hence linked to the ordinary MPW system to obtain a modular driven manual wheelchair (MDMW). The Bond Graphs of these systems are constructed and mathematical models extracted in terms of state space differential equations. Simulation results illustrating the behaviour of some dynamic variables are also shown. This paper is aimed at providing good support for the academic field on dynamic system modelling using Bond Graph and Matlab Simulink.