Closed-loop underwater soft robotic foil shape control using flexible e-skin

Fuente: arXiv
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Auteurs principaux: Micklem, Leo, Dong, Huazhi, Giorgio-Serchi, Francesco, Yang, Yunjie, Weymouth, Gabriel D., Thornton, Blair
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2024
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author Micklem, Leo
Dong, Huazhi
Giorgio-Serchi, Francesco
Yang, Yunjie
Weymouth, Gabriel D.
Thornton, Blair
author_facet Micklem, Leo
Dong, Huazhi
Giorgio-Serchi, Francesco
Yang, Yunjie
Weymouth, Gabriel D.
Thornton, Blair
contents The use of soft robotics for real-world underwater applications is limited, even more than in terrestrial applications, by the ability to accurately measure and control the deformation of the soft materials in real time without the need for feedback from an external sensor. Real-time underwater shape estimation would allow for accurate closed-loop control of soft propulsors, enabling high-performance swimming and manoeuvring. We propose and demonstrate a method for closed-loop underwater soft robotic foil control based on a flexible capacitive e-skin and machine learning which does not necessitate feedback from an external sensor. The underwater e-skin is applied to a highly flexible foil undergoing deformations from 2% to 9% of its camber by means of soft hydraulic actuators. Accurate set point regulation of the camber is successfully tracked during sinusoidal and triangle actuation routines with an amplitude of 5% peak-to-peak and 10-second period with a normalised RMS error of 0.11, and 2% peak-to-peak amplitude with a period of 5 seconds with a normalised RMS error of 0.03. The tail tip deflection can be measured across a 30 mm (0.15 chords) range. These results pave the way for using e-skin technology for underwater soft robotic closed-loop control applications.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2408_01130
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Closed-loop underwater soft robotic foil shape control using flexible e-skin
Micklem, Leo
Dong, Huazhi
Giorgio-Serchi, Francesco
Yang, Yunjie
Weymouth, Gabriel D.
Thornton, Blair
Robotics
The use of soft robotics for real-world underwater applications is limited, even more than in terrestrial applications, by the ability to accurately measure and control the deformation of the soft materials in real time without the need for feedback from an external sensor. Real-time underwater shape estimation would allow for accurate closed-loop control of soft propulsors, enabling high-performance swimming and manoeuvring. We propose and demonstrate a method for closed-loop underwater soft robotic foil control based on a flexible capacitive e-skin and machine learning which does not necessitate feedback from an external sensor. The underwater e-skin is applied to a highly flexible foil undergoing deformations from 2% to 9% of its camber by means of soft hydraulic actuators. Accurate set point regulation of the camber is successfully tracked during sinusoidal and triangle actuation routines with an amplitude of 5% peak-to-peak and 10-second period with a normalised RMS error of 0.11, and 2% peak-to-peak amplitude with a period of 5 seconds with a normalised RMS error of 0.03. The tail tip deflection can be measured across a 30 mm (0.15 chords) range. These results pave the way for using e-skin technology for underwater soft robotic closed-loop control applications.
title Closed-loop underwater soft robotic foil shape control using flexible e-skin
topic Robotics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2408.01130