VacuumVLA: Boosting VLA Capabilities via a Unified Suction and Gripping Tool for Complex Robotic Manipulation

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Zhou, Hui, Huang, Siyuan, Li, Minxing, Zhang, Hao, Fan, Lue, Shi, Shaoshuai
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2025
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author Zhou, Hui
Huang, Siyuan
Li, Minxing
Zhang, Hao
Fan, Lue
Shi, Shaoshuai
author_facet Zhou, Hui
Huang, Siyuan
Li, Minxing
Zhang, Hao
Fan, Lue
Shi, Shaoshuai
contents Vision Language Action models have significantly advanced general purpose robotic manipulation by harnessing large scale pretrained vision and language representations. Among existing approaches, a majority of current VLA systems employ parallel two finger grippers as their default end effectors. However, such grippers face inherent limitations in handling certain real world tasks such as wiping glass surfaces or opening drawers without handles due to insufficient contact area or lack of adhesion. To overcome these challenges, we present a low cost, integrated hardware design that combines a mechanical two finger gripper with a vacuum suction unit, enabling dual mode manipulation within a single end effector. Our system supports flexible switching or synergistic use of both modalities, expanding the range of feasible tasks. We validate the efficiency and practicality of our design within two state of the art VLA frameworks: DexVLA and Pi0. Experimental results demonstrate that with the proposed hybrid end effector, robots can successfully perform multiple complex tasks that are infeasible for conventional two finger grippers alone. All hardware designs and controlling systems will be released.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2511_21557
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle VacuumVLA: Boosting VLA Capabilities via a Unified Suction and Gripping Tool for Complex Robotic Manipulation
Zhou, Hui
Huang, Siyuan
Li, Minxing
Zhang, Hao
Fan, Lue
Shi, Shaoshuai
Robotics
Artificial Intelligence
Vision Language Action models have significantly advanced general purpose robotic manipulation by harnessing large scale pretrained vision and language representations. Among existing approaches, a majority of current VLA systems employ parallel two finger grippers as their default end effectors. However, such grippers face inherent limitations in handling certain real world tasks such as wiping glass surfaces or opening drawers without handles due to insufficient contact area or lack of adhesion. To overcome these challenges, we present a low cost, integrated hardware design that combines a mechanical two finger gripper with a vacuum suction unit, enabling dual mode manipulation within a single end effector. Our system supports flexible switching or synergistic use of both modalities, expanding the range of feasible tasks. We validate the efficiency and practicality of our design within two state of the art VLA frameworks: DexVLA and Pi0. Experimental results demonstrate that with the proposed hybrid end effector, robots can successfully perform multiple complex tasks that are infeasible for conventional two finger grippers alone. All hardware designs and controlling systems will be released.
title VacuumVLA: Boosting VLA Capabilities via a Unified Suction and Gripping Tool for Complex Robotic Manipulation
topic Robotics
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.21557