Food tray carrying robot with man-machine interface

A food tray carrying robot with a three-dimensional drive system and a man-machine interface is proposed. No electrical power is required to maintain the horizontal position of a food tray since a parallel link mechanism is used in the radial direction drive mechanism. The three-dimensional man-machine interface using strain gages is set under the food tray. A patient needs only small finger force to move the food tray because of the use of the three-dimensional man-machine interface. In the paper, the concept of the food tray carrying robot, the mechanical construction, the three-dimensional man-machine interface using strain gages, the control system, some of the experimental results, and the modeling of the robot arm are presented.