‘Like wearing a mousetrap’
Saskatchewan ergonomics researchers study exoskeletons for farmers
A team of researchers at the University of Saskatchewan hopes technology used in the manufacturing sector could help make farming a less backbreaking profession.
Dr. Catherine Trask, a Canada research chair in ergonomics and musculoskeletal health, is working alongside research fellow Ornwipa Thamsuwan to measure the effectiveness of mechanical exoskeletons in farm work.
Thamsuwan said the devices they are testing are already commercially available and used in industries such as warehousing and auto manufacturing.
While the phrase “mechanical exoskeleton” may conjure images of superhuman cyborg farmers hurling bales, Trask said the devices she and Thamsuwan are looking at don’t use an external power source. Rather, they essentially store the body’s own energy as it bends forward, then provide a boost on the way back up.
“It’s kind of like wearing a mousetrap,” Trask said of the roughly three-kilogram harnesses, which use springs to link bars across the wearer’s chest and thighs.
Thamsuwan spent the 2019 growing season visiting farms and livestock operations and having actual producers test the harnesses on day-to-day tasks such as shovelling grain or repairing machinery.
She collected data from 15 farmers using sensors that track muscle activity and posture. She also gathered feedback directly from the farmers themselves.
Trask said they are now in the process of tabulating the reams of information generated from the study, with early results showing some promise for the harnesses’ ability to help farmers maintain higher productivity at less of a toll on their bodies.
“We’re moving at the speed of research,” she chuckled.
Thamsuwan said as many as 60 per cent of farmers already experience back pain over the course of a typical year. She said that number is likely to rise as the average farmer’s age continues to increase, meaning more operations might have a business case for using exoskeletons.
Trask said the exoskeletons have been used in other industries for as long as a decade, but the technology is likely arriving late to the farming sector due to the lack of worker protections for producers, who tend to be individually employed.
“There’s no health and safety office that they can go and talk to about this kind of stuff like you would have at a big auto manufacturer, for example.”
While Trask and Thamsuwan hope farmers will take an interest in their research, they also plan to make their findings available to exoskeleton designers, in order to help them create products specifically tailored to farm work.