TorqueCapsules: Fully-Encapsulated Flywheel Actuation Modules for Designing and Prototyping Movement-Based and Kinesthetic Interaction

Abstract

Flywheels are unique, versatile actuators that store and convert kinetic energy to torque, widely utilized in aerospace, robotics, haptics, and more. However, prototyping interaction using flywheels is not trivial due to safety concerns, unintuitive operation, and implementation challenges. We present TorqueCapsules: self-contained, fully-encapsulated flywheel actuation modules that make the flywheel actuators easy to control, safe to interact with, and quick to reconfigure and customize. By fully encapsulating the actuators with a wireless microcontroller, a battery, and other components, the module can be readily attached, embedded, or stuck to everyday objects, worn to people’s bodies, or combined with other devices. With our custom GUI, both novices and expert users can easily control multiple modules to design and prototype movements and kinesthetic haptics unique to flywheel actuation. We demonstrate various applications, including actuated everyday objects, wearable haptics, and expressive robots. We conducted workshops for novices and experts to employ TorqueCapsules to collect qualitative feedback and further application examples.