Walking assistance mechanism and walking assistance device

Abstract

A walking assistance mechanism includes: a waist side link; a thigh side link connected to the waist side link to be able to relatively swing in a front-rear direction of the user by means of a hip joint side swinging shaft; a lower leg side link connected to the thigh side link to be able to relatively swing in the front-rear direction by means of a knee joint side swinging shaft; a knee extension posture maintenance mechanism that regulates relative swinging between the thigh side link and the lower leg side link to maintain a knee extension posture in which a relative angle between the thigh side link and the lower leg side link is large; and a knee bending posture allowance mechanism that releases the regulation of the knee extension posture maintenance mechanism to allow for a knee bending posture in which the relative angle between the thigh side link and the lower leg side link becomes smaller when the thigh side link is positioned on a more rearward side than a position at which the thigh side link forms a predetermined reference relative angle with respect to the waist side link. According to the present invention, the walking assistance mechanism that allows a knee on a leg of a pedestrian on the front side to maintain an extended state and allow a knee on a leg of the pedestrian on the rear side to be bent while walking can be provided.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.