Development of a Soft Gripper Using a NonFluidic Compliant Mechanism

Soft adaptive grippers are critical in use for sensitive objects for which traditional rigid mechanical grippers may cause a serious damage. This paper depicts the development of a nonfluidic compliant soft adaptive gripper. The traditional iris mechanism is adapted and re-implemented as compliant soft adaptive gripper. An optimal solution for the compliant design is obtained iteratively using the Solidworks CAD modelling and finite element analysis FEA on ANSYS to ensure opening and closing aperture without fracture. The optimal design, obtained after many iterations, is finalized in detail to be fitted as an end-effector which is electrically actuated using a continuous servo motor. The compliant design is experimentally tested to grip different objects with different shapes, volumes, and weights. The results were promising such that only two tests out of eleven failed to be gripped. As the actuating system works smoothly. The compliant gripper can grip up to 125 grams. The compliant iris gripper has a maximum gripping diameter of 50 mm and minimum diameter of 16 mm.