Design and Development of a Novel Fixturing Solution for Handling Complex Shaped Components

Fixturing is one of the key subprocesses used in many industries such as aerospace, automobile and marine engineering. Most existing fixturing systems use pin-type end effectors which apply concentrated loads (See Fig. 1. (Left)) on objects resulting in geometrical distortions [1]. Granular jamming is a novel fixturing technique used in the field of soft robotics [3]. We propose the use of granular jamming for developing a fixturing system which minimizes the structural deformation and surface damage prevalent in pin type fixturing.