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Electromagnetic clutches have been widely used in underactuated lightweight manipulator designs as a coupling mechanism due to their advantages of fast activation and electrical controllability. However, an electromagnetic clutch consumes electrical energy continuously during its operation. Furthermore, conventional electromagnetic clutches are not fail-safe in unexpected power failure conditions. These factors have a significant impact on the energy efficiency and the safety of the design, and these are vital aspects for underactuated lightweight manipulators. This paper introduces a bistable electromagnetic coupling mechanism design, with reduced energy consumption and with a fail-safe mechanism. The concept of a bistable electromagnetic mechanism consists of an electromagnet with two permanent magnets. The design has the capability to maintain stable mechanism states, either engaged or disengaged, without a continuous electrical power supply, thus enhancing fail-safety and efficiency. Moreover, the design incorporates the advantages of conventional electromagnetic clutches such as rapid activation and electrical controllability. The experimental results highlight the effectiveness of the proposed mechanism in reducing electric energy consumption. Besides this, a theoretical model is developed and a good correlation is achieved between the theoretical and experimental results. The reduced electric energy consumption and fail-safe design make the bistable electromagnetic mechanism a promising concept for underactuated lightweight manipulators.

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A method to extract energy from an excitation which is stochastic in nature is presented. The experimental rig comprises a pendulum, and a vertical excitation is provided by a solenoid. The control input assumed in the form of a direct current motor, and another motor, used in reverse, acts as a generator. The stochastic excitation has been achieved by varying the time interval between switching the RLC circuit on and off according to a random distribution. Such non-linear vertical excitations act on an oscillatory system from which a pendulum is pivoted. The Pierson-Moskowitz spectrum has been chosen as the random distribution while an inverse transform technique has been used for generation of the random excitation signal in LabVIEW environment. Moreover, a bang-bang control algorithm has been implemented to facilitate rotational motion of the pendulum. Experimental observations have been made for various noise levels of vertical excitations, and their implication on energy generation has been discussed. A positive amount of energy has been extracted for a minimal amount of the control input.