EVALUATION OF FOOTFALL-INDUCED VIBRATIONS AND THEIR IMPORTANCE IN A BIOMECHANICS LABORATORY

Abstract

The ground reaction forces of the footfall are usually measured in biomechanics laboratories, using a force plate. The accelerations of the floor, in which the force plate is embedded, have to be limited, as they have a major influence on the accuracy of the force measurements. A floor designed to accommodate a force platform in a biomechanical laboratory of the University Hospital in Tübingen, Germany, has been investigated for footfall induced vibrations, in order to determine their influence on the precision of the force plate measurements. For that, field measurements as well as finite element analysis have been performed. As a result, the measuring error of the force plate can be computed for diverse scenarios.