Application of multiple‐response optimization methods for the ergonomic evaluation of carpet weaving knife

Abstract

AbstractThe aim of this study is to evaluate several weaving knife configurations in response to multiple criteria’s for optimum design. Nine different knife combinations were tested over ten female weavers in a field experiment. Three levels of blade width and angular orientations were taken as the independent variables. Output response about goniometry and electromyography were taken as dependent variables. Multivariate analysis was carried out to estimate the effect of independent variables on output responses. To tackle the difficulty of knife selection with several output responses, three multicriteria optimization approaches have been compared. Multivariate analysis of variance results showed that the effect of both blade width and angle were significant at wrist angles. Also, the magnitude of effect size on both blade width and the angle was highest for the wrist angles. Despite the same weighing criteria, a slight difference was evident between the ranks from optimization methods. The higher blade widths and smaller angular orientations should be recommended for reduction of wrist deviation and muscle activity during weaving. The best possible combination of knife evaluated using multicriteria optimization was 25 mm × 100°.