Haptic Devices Evaluation for Industrial Use

International audienceThe current study concerns the Assembly/Disassembly (A/D) process. Despite the latest improvements, the creationof a fully realistic VE is still challenging because of the complexity of the physical processes involved and thecurrent limitations of the available VR technology. In this context, the main purpose of this research is to improvethe A/D process simulation by proposing a new method and associated tools, as well as a better integration withhaptic devices. To this end, the first objective, regarding the software application, is to develop and evaluatethe impact of a mobility module based on predefined kinematic constraints between the assembly components,able to guide user’s movements when performing A/D operations simulation. This can be achieved through theintelligent management of the assembly components relative mobilities in contact situations. The second objective,regarding the hardware aspects, is to determine if the described approach, along with a new moderate cost hapticsystem, could represent an interesting solution for industrial use. In this sense, a comparison between the A/Dsimulation qualities provided by two commercial haptic devices (basic equipment with 3 DoF force feedback versusan expensive system with 6 DoF force feedback) was performed and it is presented in this paper. Conclusions weredrawn after series of tests conducted by a target group composed of 20 people with engineering background