FeTCh Mark 1 Manipulator

Introduction

The objective of this project is the design and implementation of a soft manipulator robot based on hybrid actuation capable of interacting with delicate objects and with the ability to team up with humans with safety due to non-hazardous contacts. Due to the actuation system used in the design associated with a new control approach, simultaneous stiffness and position control is achieved in the manipulator.

 

Overview

In the next section, you can find information related to the motivation and inspiration behind this project along with some examples of previous work related to continuum manipulators.

The fabrication of soft robots, while simple, is time-consuming. Therefore, in order to optimize our designs we opted to test the behavior of the components of the prototype previous to their fabrication. In the design section details the process of concept design and simulation of the prototype components as well as the files required to accomplish the fabrication of the prototype.

The fabrication section presents the detailed steps of the implementation of the prototype, and finally, in the testing section, we talk about the modeling approach we use to describe the behavior of the manipulator as well as the simulation of the complete prototype. A demo of the manipulator is presented in this section as well.