Modular Design, Communication and Control Systems of a 3D-printed Humanoid Robotic Hand

This article presents an innovative approach for developing the mechanical and control systems of humanoid 3D-printed hand with fingers, based on a modular principle. The novelty is in creating the 3D printed fingers as a single assembled component and embedding the actuators and control elements, thus making it a complete independent module. The new approach allows the implementation of the same software and actuating components to be used in finger modules with different individual sizes and joint constraints. The mechanical and control system of the hand is developed and a working prototype is created. It is described how to adjust and control the position of fingers with different sizes and joint constraints. The communication of the modules with the developed software is described. The repeatability of finger movement is studied and the force that each finger is capable of exerting during folding is measured. Functional experiments are performed and discussed.