Toward Developing a Velocity Controlled Tactile Impact Display

This paper presents a novel impact display capable of rendering impact on a fingertip over a range of velocities commonly experienced during everyday manipulation and tactile exploration. An optical range sensor is used to measure the separation between the user¿s finger and the contact block in which the sensor is embedded. Ordinarily, impact is rendered by imposing a rigid boundary when contact is made with a virtual object, which is experienced by the user through a thimble interface. Our impact display adds the making and breaking of contact to this experience and allows control over impact dynamics by controlling impact velocity.