Roman: Making Everyday Objects Robotically Manipulable with 3D-Printable Add-on Mechanisms [article]

Jiahao Li, Alexis Samoylov, Jeeeun Kim, Xiang 'Anthony' Chen
2022 arXiv   pre-print
One important vision of robotics is to provide physical assistance by manipulating different everyday objects, e.g., hand tools, kitchen utensils. However, many objects designed for dexterous hand-control are not easily manipulable by a single robotic arm with a generic parallel gripper. Complementary to existing research on developing grippers and control algorithms, we present Roman, a suite of hardware design and software tool support for robotic engineers to create 3D printable mechanisms
more » ... tached to everyday handheld objects, making them easier to be manipulated by conventional robotic arms. The Roman hardware comes with a versatile magnetic gripper that can snap on/off handheld objects and drive add-on mechanisms to perform tasks. Roman also provides software support to register and author control programs. To validate our approach, we designed and fabricated Roman mechanisms for 14 everyday objects/tasks presented within a design space and conducted expert interviews with robotic engineers indicating that Roman serves as a practical alternative for enabling robotic manipulation of everyday objects.
arXiv:2205.07437v1 fatcat:bengouxxjrd27alts53jxcv3vm