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Design and Modeling of a New Variable Stiffness Robotic Finger Based on Reconfigurable Beam Property Change for Flexible Grasping
Conference proceeding   Peer reviewed

Design and Modeling of a New Variable Stiffness Robotic Finger Based on Reconfigurable Beam Property Change for Flexible Grasping

Wei Xu, Jiaming Fu and Dongming Gan
Proceedings of ASME 2022 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences and Computers and Information in Engineering Conference. Volume 7: 46th Mechanisms and Robotics Conference (MR)
Mechanisms and Robotics Conference (MR), 47th (St. Louis, Missouri, USA, 08/14/2022–08/17/2022)
11/2022
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1115/DETC2022-89856
Web of Science ID: WOS:001218980700010

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Abstract

Flexible grippers can provide fine grasping and manipulation to various objects and environment interactions. However, most current mechanisms can not change the stiffness in a short time, which limits the application scenario of the flexible grippers. This paper presents a novel variable stiffness robotic finger that can adapt to soft and rigid gripping objects by continuously changing its stiffness over a wide range in a short period of time. The principle is to change the second area moment of inertia of the finger by changing the filling ratio of the cavity between two parallel beams. A complete theoretical stiffness model is developed and compared with the finite element analysis (FEA) model. Effects of multiple design parameters on finger stiffness performance are compared and analyzed, and the accuracy of the theoretical model is verified, with a maximum error of less than 6.5%. The performance of the finger is further evaluated through an experimental prototype, which proved that the finger can safely perform a wide range of daily object-grasping tasks with adaptable compliance. The proposed stiffness-varying mechanism can adjust stiffness in a short time with a very large ratio (around 1:37). The design provides a new direction in developing variable-stiffness robotic grippers for flexible grasping.

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