Conversion of Glove Device activated by Thin Artificial Muscle into Robotic Hand

Abstract

Glove devices drive actuators placed on the palm and back of the hand to assist in flexion and extension movements. We propose that the glove device be converted into a robotic hand that can be driven in the same manner as human fingers by attaching it to a skeleton that simulates a human hand. In this paper, a prototype glove device that assists the flexion and extension of the four fingers is fabricated and attached to a hand-shaped skeleton without a driving mechanism fabricated by a 3D printer to be used as a robotic hand. We compared the object grasping ability of the glove device and the prototype robotic hand, and confirmed the possibility of using the glove device as a robotic hand by incorporating it into the skeleton.