Abstract
The authors have developed a texturobot having six linear actuators and force/moment sensor that measures and evaluates the food texture. Although conventional texturometer has one degree of freedom, this robot can simulate the human mandible motion because it has six degrees of freedom. Experimental results using several plungers, columnar plunger's vertical force is smaller than V-plunger, and horizontal force is bigger than V-plunger. The V-plunger's sideway distance is in proportion or inverse proportion to the force, but the columnar plunger's data didn't support it. The V-plunger's force was 5.9 times in bread, 2.9 times in apple, 3.3 times in yokan, 1.3 times in cracker, 4.0 times in kamaboko, 3.4 times in takuan, and 5.7 times in gumi jelly.
