Rules for the EAP actuated robotic arms

SPIE’s EAPAD 2006 - EAP-in-Action Session

Rules were set to assure the fairness/sportsmanship of the competition. The focus in 2006 is on the EAP actuated robotic arms and the three strongest arms will be made to wrestle each other. The rules for this competition are

1. The robotic arm should be made to be safe to operate and should have a termination switch to allow quick terminating in case of unforeseen condition that may lead to hazard.

2. The robotic arm has to be actuated by an EAP material and the actuators should be approved by the organization committee prior to the participation in the competition.

3. Access to the drive actuators should be made available to allow direct viewing and confirmation of the drive mechanism prior to the beginning to the match.

4. As realistic as possible, the robotic arm needs to emulate the wrestling action of a human arm.

5. As much as possible, the structural elements of the robot arm should be made of polymer base materials.

6. As much as possible, the shape and dimensions of the robotic arm should match an arm of an average adult human.

7. The robotic arm should not perform any intentional damaging acts

8. To assure fairness - the robotic arm should have a mechanism that is reversible, namely, it should be possible to rotate the arm both left and right in order to assure the capability to win and lose.

9. To allow connecting the arms for wrestling between them their hand needs have a clip or ring that is designed to assure that they can be placed as close as possible along a single plane so that they can be "free" to rotate the "opponent arm" to their side (just as human wrestlers do).

To return to:
NDEAA Webhub or to the
WorldWide Electroactive Polymers (WW-EAP) Webhub