Patent ID: 7823382

Claim:
An active material actuator assembly comprising: a plurality of movable members; a fixed member; an anchor member; a base member; wherein said movable members, said fixed member and said anchor member are aligned on said base member with said fixed member between said movable members and said anchor member; a plurality of active material components, each active material component being operatively connected to a respective one of said movable members and to said anchor member; a plurality of automatic locking mechanisms each operable for automatically locking one of said movable members to one of an adjacent one of said movable members and said fixed member; wherein activation of said active material components in order sequentially from that one connected to one of said movable members most distal from said anchor member to that one connected to one of said movable members most proximal to said anchor member respectively changes at least one dimension of each active material component to move each movable member toward said anchor member sufficiently to allow locking of said movable member to one of said adjacent one of said movable members and said fixed member, said most distal movable member thereby being moved toward said fixed member a distance determined by a sum of respective amounts of dimension change of each one of said active material components, such that an actuation force acting on said most distal movable member is modulated.