Combining Thermoelectrics and Low Melting Point Alloys to Create Reconfigurable Stiff-Compliant Manipulators
AUTHORS
ABSTRACT
Soft robots have garnered great interest in recent
years due to their ability to navigate complex environments
and enhance safety during unplanned collisions. However, their
softness typically limits the forces they can apply and payloads
they can carry, compared to traditional rigid-link robots. In
this paper we seek to create a hybrid manipulator that can
switch between a state in which it acts as a soft robot, and
a state in which it has a series of selectively stiffenable links.
The latter state, accomplished by solidifying chambers of low
melting point metal alloy within the robot, is in some ways
analogous to a traditional rigid-link manipulator. It also has the
added benefit that each “link” can be set to a desired straight or
curved shape before solidification and re-shaped when desired.
Thermoelectric heat pumps enable local heating and cooling of
the alloy, and tendons running along the robot enable actuation.
Using a simple two-link prototype, we illustrate how alloy
melting and solidification can be used to modify the robot’s
workspace and payload capacity
Tags: Conference Papers 2024