High-Precision Three-Axis Force Sensor for Five-Fingered Haptic Interface

Abstract

In this paper, we have developed a small size high-precision three-axis force sensor, a compact sensor amplifier circuit with 24-bit high resolution, and an interface FPGA circuit. These circuits are mounted on the back of the haptic hand, and the output signals of the force sensors are input to the interface FPGA circuit, which communicate to the main control PC with LAN. Therefore, we could reduce the number of wires in the control system. Furthermore, we carried out an experimental test and confirmed the improvement of the haptic interface. This experiment demonstrates the high potential of the five-fingered haptic interface robot HIRO II+ with the developed three-axis force sensors. The next problem to be tackled is to investigate the cause of the force error and based on those results, to improve HIRO II+ further. This paper was supported by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications Strategic Information and Communications R&D Promotion Programme (SCOPE) and by a JSPS Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B) (19360190).