A free-rotating gripper for grasping or rotating an object

Abstract

Automation of display and disposal products is strongly required at convenience stores. However, it is difficult for robots to correct the posture of fallen products and to grasp and transport products in any posture. In this paper, we developed robot hand with free rotation gripper which can switch grasp or rotate products easily for efficient work. It has rotating plate at the end of the robot hand and two grip modes. They are “Grasp mode” and “Rotation mode”. Grasp mode prevents free rotation of gripped object, and Rotation mode can change the posture of gripped object. The posture of object is determined by the relationship between the grip position and the position of the center of gravity. With this robot hand, performance evaluation experiment was conducted; the result confirmed that the robot hand was able to grip cork block, convenience store's rice ball and sandwich in Grasp mode and Rotation mode, and gripper behavior was changed by the grip mode.