Wolverine: A Wearable Haptic Interface for Grasping in VR

Abstract

The Wolverine is a mobile, wearable haptic device designed for simulating the grasping of rigid objects in virtual environment. In contrast to prior work on force feedback gloves, we focus on creating a low cost, lightweight, and wireless device that renders a force directly between the thumb and three fingers to simulate objects held in pad opposition type grasps. Leveraging low-power brake-based locking sliders, the system can withstand over 100N of force between each finger and the thumb, and only consumes 2.78 Wh(10 mJ) for each braking interaction. Integrated sensors are used both for feedback control and user input: time-of-flight sensors provide the position of each finger and an IMU provides overall orientation tracking. This design enables us to use the device for roughly 6 hours with 5500 full fingered grasping events. The total weight is 55g including a 350 mAh battery.