An electro-conjugate fluid (ECF) is a kind of functional fluid, which produces a flow (ECF flow) when subjected to high
DC voltage. Since it only requires a tiny electrode pair in micrometer size in order to generate the ECF flow, the ECF is
a promising micro fluid pressure source. This study proposes a novel micro robot hand using the ECF. The robot hand is
mainly composed of five flexible fingers and an ECF flow generator. The flexible finger is made of silicone rubber
having several chambers in series along its axis. When the chambers are depressurized, the chambers deflate resulting in
making the actuator bend. On the other hand, the ECF flow generator has a needle-ring electrode pair inside. When
putting the ECF flow generator into the ECF and applying voltage of 6.0 kV to the electrode pair, we can obtain the
pressure of 33.1 kPa. Using the components mentioned above, we developed the ECF robot hand. The height, the width
and the mass of the robot hand are 45 mm, 40 mm and 5.2 g, respectively. Since the actuator is flexible, the robot hand
can grasp various objects with various shapes without complex controller.
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