Project

# Title Team Members TA Documents Sponsor
3 Robotic Manipulator with User Force-Feedback
Noah Franceschini
Sohan Patel
Jason Paximadas design_document1.pdf
final_paper1.pdf
photo1.jpg
photo2.jpg
presentation1.pptx
proposal1.pdf
Robotic Manipulator with User Force-Feedback

Team Members:
- Sohan Patel (sohankp2)
- Noah Franceschini (nef3)

**Problem**

A common need in Industry, and especially in today's increasingly virtual world is to interact with objects where it may not be possible from a logistic or health standpoint to do so. We have robotic manipulators and virtual simulations, but there is still a huge gap between real life and these current solutions. In a setting where an object is hazardous and may be fragile, it is paramount to be able to control how much pressure one is applying to the object, and be able to adjust it quickly and in a way that feels natural.

**Solution**

We would like to make two devices that work together to solve this issue. We want to create a manipulator that mirrors the user's movements and can accurately communicate the amount of force being exerted back to the user. The user would wear a glove that can track each finger's movement independently and apply the force experienced by the manipulator back to the user's hand. This would allow the wearer to easily discern the amount of force they are applying to an object without actually touching it themselves. This both solves the issue of being able to quickly and easily feel the force they are applying, as well as increasing user immersion, as wearing a glove is much more natural than using a different control mechanism. It would also allow a user to differentiate between objects quickly, for example the feeling of a foam ball vs a solid one.

**Subsystems**

**Glove**

This subsystem will be what the user actually wears, and will both track movements of each finger as well as apply the forces back to the wearer. It will need to support a wide range of resistance to motion, from light resistance as if one was squishing a foam ball, to being able to fully stop the fingers from moving

Components:

- Potentiometers or Flex sensors to determine the position of the user's fingers, will experiment with both
- Small motors to provide the required resistance to the fingers, or arrest movement entirely.

**Manipulator**

This subsystem will be what interacts with the object and relays resistance encountered by it to the glove. The manipulator itself will be 3D printed from an inexpensive plastic such as PLA.

Components:
- Small servos modified with low resistance shunt resistors to allow us to measure current, this allows us to know how much resistance each finger is encountering.

- 3D printed robot "hand" that has all the supporting structure needed to mount the electronics.

**Controller**

This is the brain of our project, it will be a microcontroller based device that can process the raw data coming from both the glove and manipulator, then facilitate the communication between the two.
Components:
- Microcontroller, ATmega328p or ATmega2560
- Stepper motor drivers
- Drivers for the user force-feedback, in the form of a motor and controller combination that can support dynamically adjusting the amount of tension.

**Criterion For Success**

- Track each finger and have the robot mirror those movements
- Measure the forces experienced by the manipulator
- Apply those forces to the user's hand
- Support resistance as well as stopping hand movement
- The user should be able to differentiate between a force caused by a solid object, vs one generated by a soft object compressing. The glove should not try and stop all movement in the latter case.
- Low latency operation, the manipulator should not have a delay more than .5 to 1 second.

Logic Circuit Teaching Board

Younas Abdul Salam, Andrzej Borzecki, David Lee

Featured Project

Partners: Younas Abdul Salam, Andrzej Borzecki, David Lee

The proposal our group has is of creating a board that will be able to teach students about logic circuits hands on. The project will consist of a board and different pieces that represent gates. The board will be used to plug in the pieces and provide power to the internal circuitry of the pieces. The pieces will have a gate and LEDs inside, which will be used to represent the logic at the different terminals.

By plugging in and combining gates, students will be able to see the actual effect on logic from the different combinations that they make. To add to it, we will add a truth table that can be used to represent inputs and outputs required, for example, for a class project or challenge. The board will be able to read the truth table and determine whether the logic the student has created is correct.

This board can act as a great learning source for students to understand the working of logic circuits. It can be helpful in teaching logic design to students in high schools who are interested in pursuing a degree in Electrical Engineering.

Please comment on whether the project is good enough to be approved, and if there are any suggestions.

Thank you