Design for manufacture of a low-cost haptic degree-of-freedom

Haptic technology enables systems to interact with the human's sense of touch, and has been proposed for applications across a wide variety of domains. The cost prohibitive nature of most haptic devices however remains a contributing factor in preventing widespread real-world implementation. While some low-cost commercial-off-the-shelf haptic devices have been introduced, they do not provide the range of capabilities required by many applications. One solution to achieving the capability required using these devices is through the addition of adaptors and mechanisms. In doing so however there are distinct challenges in maintaining low-cost implementation. This work proposes an additional degree of freedom for the commercially available Phantom Omni haptic device. Torque feedback around the roll axis of the user-held stylus is achieved through a custom detachable stylus attachment. To maintain low-cost design while achieving realistic force feedback commercial off-the-shelf hardware including a positional encoder and DC actuator is employed. In terms of the required mechanical fabrication, manufacture through low-cost rapid prototyping was utilised as discussed in this paper. In order to demonstrate the operation of the system, spring-based haptic rendering simulating a screw insertion task was implemented.