Abstract
We present the design, analysis, control and characterization of a general purpose, six degrees-of-freedom (DoF) haptic interface for the rendering of elements and interior equipment like sliders, drawers, eyeglass holders or gloveboxes in a car. One of the major challenges in the design of six DoF haptic interfaces is the trade-off between workspace size, stiffness, output capability, and bandwidth. In order to meet this challenge we propose a new kinematic structure that allows to cover a relatively large workspace in both rotational and translational degrees of freedom, while ensuring high velocity and force output capabilities to render a wide range of impedances. An admittance controller with model-based gravity and Coriolis compensation is implemented to render different types of elements and interior equipment in a car. Hardware-related performance measures like dexterous workspace and output capabilities are derived based on kinematic and dynamic simulations and are compared to state-of-the-art devices. © 2013 IEEE.