A low cost 3D-printed robot joint torque sensor

Abstract

Technological advances allow researchers to develop advanced arm robots and can safely work side by side with humans Therefore, a robot arm controller can be designed in such way that the robot arm can move along the desired trajectories and act upon external influences, in this last case, the torque sensor plays an important rule. Currently torque sensors are available in the market has a high price. In this work, an inexpensive robot joint torque sensor is presented. Most parts of this sensor are made using 3D printers. While the other components are easily can be found in the market and with a relatively low-costs. The development of this sensor is intended to facilitate the prototyping of the robot arm for educational and research purposes. The basic idea of the sensor mechanism is to convert torque into a force absorbed by a spring. Then, the encoder senses the direction and the value of the input torque. This torque sensor can be easily too customized. Thus this sensor can be tailored to the needs by replacing some parts such as encoder and spring. The mechanism of this sensor can also be adjusted with the actuator to be paired. Experiments have been conducted to verify the accuracy and the performance of the proposed torque sensor.