ピックアップ操作中の弾性フィンガーグリッパの大変形解析

抄録

Robot grippers with elastic fingers have been recently developed to resolve challenging issues for gripping irregular objects adaptively. The finger of these grippers is flexible and jointless. The gripping motion is performed utilizing large elastic deformation of the fingers. The flexibility of the fingers enables the grippers to adapt to various objects. However, the fingers are also elastically deformed by the object’s weight loaded on the fingers. This deformation significantly reduces the gripping force at the moment of picking up the object. This paper analyzes the large deflection of an elastic finger gripper to estimate the reduction in gripping force at the moment of picking up an object. The elastic finger is modeled as a series of rigid links connected with torsional springs. The finger deflection is analyzed based on the principle of stationary potential energy. The estimation of the reduction in gripping force of the elastic finger gripper in picking-up operation is shown in a numerical example of picking up a rigid rectangular object with a pinching motion.