Design and Performance of a Tactile Shape Display Using RC Servomotors (Short Paper)

Abstract

Tactile displays are used to convey small-scale force and shape information to the fingertip. We describe a 6x6 tactile shape display design that is low in cost and easily constructed. It uses commercially available RC servomotors to actuate an array of mechanical pins. The pins deflect a maximum of 2mm. with a resolution of 0.1mm. The pin center spacing is 2mm and the pin diameter is 1mm. For the maximum deflection of 2mm, the display can represent frequencies up to 7.5 Hz; smaller deflections lead to achievable frequencies up to 25 Hz because the servos are slew-rate limited. This design is wel suited to tactile display research, as it offers reasonable performance in a robust and inexpensive package.