The ability to selectively stiffen otherwise compliant soft actuators increases their versatility and dexterity. We investigate granular jamming and layer jamming as two possible methods to achieve stiffening with PneuFlex actuators, a type of soft continuum actuator. The paper details five designs of jamming compartments that can be attached to an actuator. We evaluate the stiffening of the five different prototypes, achieving an up to 8-fold increase in stiffness. The strength of the most effective prototype based on layer jamming is also validated in the context of pushing buttons, resulting in an 2.23-fold increase in pushing force.


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    Title :

    Selective stiffening of soft actuators based on jamming


    Contributors:


    Publication date :

    2015-05-01


    Size :

    3522410 byte




    Type of media :

    Conference paper


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English



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