Force Plate

At the RVC Structure and Motion Lab, I was tasked with building a 6-axis force plate to measure ground reaction forces in salamanders. This was a part of a project led by Prof. John Hutchinson and Dr. Stephanie Pierce investigating early tetrapod locomotion.

The plate was made of CNCed aluminum arms, with acrylic feet and plate. The plate was transparent in order to obtain a camera perspective from below. The aluminum arms were outfitted with strain gauges arranged in full and half wheatstone bridges in order to detect X, Y, Z forces and moments. Data collection and analysis was carried out in NI-DAQ, Labview, and Matlab.

The force plate has since also been used to measure jumping in frogs.