Book Description

"In aerospace industry, the assembly operator is often exposed to potential ergonomic injuries due to awkward postures while working in confined spaces. Manually generating worker postures in simulation software for ergonomic analysis is cumbersome. This research focuses on the use of marker-based optical motion capture technology to generate human motion simulations in real-time for ergonomic analysis. To address the challenges involved in capturing human motions in a real work environment, an assembly operation was simulated in a four-walled Computer Automated Virtual Environment (CAVE) which provides an immersive 3D environment to the worker performing the assembly operation. Multiple cameras were set-up to capture motion data during fastening operation on a physical fuselage mock-up model as well as during virtual fastening developed using the CAVE. To facilitate the setting up of a portable turn-key motion capture system, a methodology for placing multiple cameras was developed. The process of transforming body joint coordinates of the human skeleton model in the motion capture system to the digital human model used for ergonomic analysis is explained. Anomalies in human motion simulation during motion capture were identified and corrected in real-time using anatomical body joint limits and a Kalman filter based predictive filtering algorithm, without the need for post-processing of motion data. The developed system has been demonstrated for human motion capture, graphic simulation and ergonomic analysis of fastening operation on a physical mock-up model and also virtual model of the belly section of an aircraft fuselage"--Abstract, leaf iii.