A gripper for gripping and spinning a pipe body includes: a rotatable input shaft; a gripping means for gripping the pipe body; a spinning means for spinning the pipe body while it is being gripped by the gripping means; a coupling means for connecting the rotatable input shaft to the gripping means and to the spinning means and for selectively engaging the gripping means and the spinning means ; and a braking means configured to engage the differential coupling means so as to selectively prevent at least one of the gripping means and the spinning means from being operated upon rotating the rotatable input shaft. The coupling means may comprise a differential coupling.

A gripper capable of lifting a work piece includes: a body including a sliding direction and a lifting axis defining a first angle relative to the sliding direction; a plurality of sliding blocks slidably mounted on the body and located at two sides of the lifting axis to move in the sliding direction toward or away from each other, wherein the sliding blocks each include a receiving hole at a second angle relative to the sliding direction; and a plurality of fingers slidably disposed in the receiving holes, and each including: a nose portion disposed in the receiving holes, and a finger portion to grip the work piece. When the sliding blocks are in the lifting position, the fingers are retracted into the receiving holes to make the finger portions move up along the lifting axis toward the body by a certain distance while clamping the work piece.

A robot hand, and a robot hand control method and program are provided that are capable of performing an assembly task at high speed while alleviating shock between a gripped object (20) and an assembly target object (22). A robot hand (100) includes a hand (12), a displacement sensor (14), an estimation section, and a controller (16). The hand (12) includes an anti-slip mechanism at a contact portion with the gripped object (20) and a mechanism capable of anisotropic movement in three degrees of freedom under external force. The displacement sensor (14) is configured to detect a displacement amount of the hand (12) when an external force has been applied to the hand (12) from a state of mechanical equilibrium existing prior to application of the external force. Based on the displacement amount detected by the sensor, the estimation section is configured to estimate position-orientation-displacement amounts of the gripped object (20) when the gripped object (20) is being assembled to an assembly target object (22). The controller (16) includes a control section configured to control the hand (12) based on the position/orientation-displacement amounts of the gripped object as estimated by the estimation section so as to assemble the gripped object (20) to the assembly target object (22).

An interchangeable tool including a finger of a shape suitable for various components is mechanically detachably mounted to a robot arm. This eliminates the need for seeking the origin of the actuator for each interchange. By interchanging fingers themselves, the entire end effector can be reduced in size and weight.

A film suction mechanism is provided which can prevent a film-like member from warping or sagging for reliable suction, handing over, or the like of the film-like member. A film suction mechanism of the present invention is a film suction mechanism for processing or transferring a flexible film-like member. The film suction mechanism includes a suction unit having a function of attaching the film-like member thereto by suction and an air nozzle having a function of blowing pressurized air onto a first surface of the film-like member. The suction unit includes a plurality of suction pads. The suction unit is capable of attaching a second surface of the film-like member thereto by suction while the pressurized air is blown onto the first surface of the film-like member.

Shape-shifting fingers may enable parallel-jaw gripper to re-grasp objects. In some embodiments, a gripper includes two fingers each having a flexible membrane which is moveable between an extended state and a retracted state in response to pressure applied to a cavity at least partially formed by the membrane. In the extended and retracted state the shape of the flexible membrane may change based on the pressure and/or a force applied to the membrane and may attain two distinct geometric forms to facilitate distinct manipulation functionalities. In some embodiments, the flexible membrane switches between a wedge-shaped geometry in the extended state and a V-shaped geometry in the retracted state. The wedge-shaped geometry may provide a point contact on a cylindrical object so that the object may pivot to a vertical position under the effect of gravity. The V-shaped geometry may localize the object in a vertical position and securely hold it.

A programmable motion system is disclosed that includes a dynamic end effector system. The dynamic end effector system includes an end effector that is coupled via a dynamic coupling to the programmable motion system, wherein the dynamic coupling provides that at least a portion of the end effector may spin with respect to an other portion of the end effector.

A telescoping linear extension robot includes a base configured to support the telescoping linear extension robot, a first driven platform, drivingly coupled to the base, a second driven platform, drivingly coupled to the first driven platform, and a floating intermediate platform. The intermediate platform is configured to increase the extendable range of the driven extensions by facilitating additional extension using force generated by the driven platforms of the robot. This, in turn, allows for long-reach robot solutions with reduced physical footprint, complexity and cost.

Embodiments described herein relate to systems and methods for adjusting a grip on an object held by a gripper of a robotic system. The gripper manipulates the object to bring a portion of the object into contact with a supporting surface underlying the object, and the gripper undergoes one or more displacements relative the object to apply frictional pushes to the object while the object is held stationary against the supporting surface. The gripper maintains contact with the object during the one or more displacements, and the one or more displacements are at least partially directed towards the supporting surface. According to some aspects, such manipulation strategies provide a functionality of fixturing an object for regripping without requiring customized fixture hardware.

Embodiments described herein relate to systems and methods for manipulating the position and/or orientation of an object while it is held in a robotic gripper. In one such embodiment, one or more physically possible and stable displacements for moving an object relative to a gripper using one or more frictional pushes may be determined and applied to the object to move the object from a first position and orientation to a second position and orientation while the object is held by the gripper. In certain embodiments, the physically possible and stable displacements may be determined using an appropriate motion cone approximation.