Make conductive rubber and use it to create a flexible touch sensitive robot skin. The resulting skin can be stretched across a frame or mounted on solid surfaces. It can also be mounted on curved surfaces or clothing.
It is touch sensitive and will produce an electrical signal no matter where you press on it.
It is touch sensitive and will produce an electrical signal no matter where you press on it.
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Step 1 pic shows a 3d exploded illustration of the layers that make up the robot skin. It was made using 123d. Thumb pic shows the edge 0f the finished robot skin.
Ideally, this robot skin could be 3d printed. With a more intricate pattern, the feel and resiliency of human skin could probably be achieved. Unfortunately, 3d silicone printing is beyond the reach of my limited budget, and as far as I know, no one so far is 3d printing conductive rubber.
Oogoo II-A Conductive Rubber
You can make your own conductive rubber from silicone caulk, corn starch, solvent, and graphite powder. This creates a silicone rubber which can be made thin enough to paint on or thick enough to cast into molds.
Oogoo II can be cast into sheets and then laminated to create a layered robot skin that conducts electricity when under pressure. The layers are designed to conduct between two layers, no matter where you press on the surface of the skin.
Ideally, this robot skin could be 3d printed. With a more intricate pattern, the feel and resiliency of human skin could probably be achieved. Unfortunately, 3d silicone printing is beyond the reach of my limited budget, and as far as I know, no one so far is 3d printing conductive rubber.
Oogoo II-A Conductive Rubber
You can make your own conductive rubber from silicone caulk, corn starch, solvent, and graphite powder. This creates a silicone rubber which can be made thin enough to paint on or thick enough to cast into molds.
Oogoo II can be cast into sheets and then laminated to create a layered robot skin that conducts electricity when under pressure. The layers are designed to conduct between two layers, no matter where you press on the surface of the skin.
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Although it doesn't show the wires, If you look at the step 1 pic, the layer 2 and layer 4 wires are connected together and layer 3 makes up the other side of the switch.
The wires are simply glued to the edge of the layers using Oogoo II. But it would be tidier to embed them when the layers are being cast.
And imagine "fingers" that could tell you what they were FEELING.
It a little more complicated than simple resistance everywhere. No matter where you press on the square of skin it has a resistance of 300-400 ohms. Less if you press real hard. Pressure expands one layer and compresses two, so the resistance does not vary in a linear fashion.
To get more precise detection, the conductive layers could be divided into smaller squares with their own wires and tiled side by side to give better resolution.
I have changed it to say four layers.
-Measure the resistance from the 4 corners
-Using the difference between resistance as measured from the right and resistance as measured from the left, you can figure out how far right/left the touch is, by using the known resistance of the material. (Higher resistance when measured from the right means that the touch is on the left.)
-Same for up/down
This method only works for a single touch, but could still be useful.
I do have a couple of questions though (vaguely leading in the direction Hom3rSimpson was suggesting).
1) What is the approximate conductivity of the oogoo itsself in terms of ohms per inch?
2) Since the oogoo is squishy (scientific term), does its conductivity vary based on how much pressure is applied? If so, it might also be helpful to figure out the conductivity in terms of pressure per inch.
Seriously, though, this is very good, thanks for sharing.
Adding the wire or conductive thread on the first pour would be a more compact way to do it.
The skin conducts by pushing in between the insulating spacers. With only two layers and one set of spacers, there would be dead spots where you push directly on a spacer.
I must give it a try!!!
thanks!
just havent found the time to experiment with it
very neat job =]