Everyday Finger: A Robotic Finger That Meets the Needs of Everyday Interactive Manipulation

We provide the mechanical and dynamical re- quirements for a robotic finger capable of performing a large number of everyday tasks. To match these requirements, we present a novel actuator and finger design, the everyday finger, that comes close to many characteristics of the human fingers. In particular, we focus on minimizing the size of components to get proper performance without sacrificing compactness. A robotic hand that uses two Everyday fingers demonstrated an 80% success rate in picking up and placing dishes in a rack, and the ability to pick up flat objects like napkins and delicate ones like strawberries. Videos are available at the project website: https://sites.google.com/view/everydayfinger.