Francesco Massi

Contact of a Finger on Rigid Surfaces and Textiles: Friction Coefficient and Induced Vibrations

The tactile information about object surfaces is obtained through perceived contact stresses and friction-induced vibrations generated by the relative motion between the fingertip and the touched object. The friction forces affect the skin stress-state distribution during surface scanning, while the sliding contact generates vibrations that propagate in the finger skin activating the receptors (mechanoreceptors) and allowing the brain to identify objects and perceive information about their properties. In this article, the friction coefficient between a real human finger and both rigid surfaces and fabrics is retrieved as a function of the contact parameters (load and scanning speed). Then, the analysis of the vibration spectra is carried out to investigate the features of the induced vibrations, measured on the fingernail, as a function of surface textures and contact parameters. While the friction coefficient measurements on rigid surfaces agree with empirical laws found in literature, the behaviour of the friction coefficient when touching a fabric is more complex, and is mainly the function of the textile constructional properties. Results show that frequency spectrum distribution, when touching a rigid surface, is mainly determined by the relative geometry of the two contact surfaces and by the contact parameters. On the contrary, when scanning a fabric, the structure and the deformation of the textile itself largely affect the spectrum of the induced vibration. Finally, some major features of the measured vibrations (frequency distribution and amplitude) are found to be representative of tactile perception compared to psychophysical and neurophysiologic works in literature.

Experimental analysis of friction-induced vibrations at the finger contact surface:

Abstract When a finger moves to scan the surface of an object, the sliding contact generates vibrations that propagate in the finger skin and transmit the information about the object characteristics to mechanoreceptors. Mechanoreceptors convert vibrations into electric impulses sent to the brain. In this context, by appropriate experiments, a frequency analysis of the signal characterizing the surface scanning can be carried out to investigate the vibration spectrum measured on the finger and to highlight how the tactile sense is connected to the measured frequency spectra. Although the correlation between the surface roughness with respect to the tactile sensation is deeply analysed in the literature, the vibration spectra induced by the finger—surface scanning and the consequent activation of mechanoreceptors on the skin were rarely investigated. In particular, in this paper, interests will be focused on the changes shown in the vibration spectra, caused by variations in the characteristic contact parameters such as scanning velocity and roughness.

Friction Measurement on Dry Fabric for Forming Simulation of Composite Reinforcement

Forming processes are highly influenced by all the interface conditions between the tooling and the workpieces. For thermo-mechanical processes like hot forging or cutting processes friction is widely studied for a long time but for composite parts, it is not the case because the problem is not so crucial: forming forces are generally weak enough to allow the part be realized with any forming device; surface quality is not highly affected by the friction conditions; for pre-impregnated fabrics, the viscous or even fluid matrix acts like a lubricant and avoids defects due to sticking between fibre reinforcement and metallic tools. Nevertheless, friction seems to have an important role when precise simulations are expected. Up to now, few studies have been focussed on friction during composite forming processes. The aim of the present study is to make a contribution on that topic for an experimental point of view using an high precision device able to measure small friction forces. The relative fibre orientations can be monitored in order to explore the whole range of geometrical configurations. The final goal is to develop an efficient tool for finite element simulations of dry and pre-impregnated fibre fabrics accounting for the main specificity of fabrics, that is to say their strong anisotropy.

Dynamic analysis of surface scanning for tactile perception

The human hand works in a perfect accord with the brain for an efficient exploration of physical world and objects perception according to man’s purposes. During the haptic sensing, the fingertip slides on a surface activating the receptors located under the skin allowing the brain to identify objects and information about their properties. In fact, in order to create the contact, the hand must exercise a force causing the fingertip to deform, generating a stress-state that contains the information on the object in contact. The information concerning the object surface is represented by the vibrations induced by the friction between the skin and the rubbed object in contact. The mechanoreceptors have the key role of transducing the stress state into an electrical impulse conveyed to the brain. Nevertheless, the vibration spectra induced by the finger/surface rubbing and the consequent activation of the mechanoreceptors on the skin were rarely investigated. A clear understanding of the mechanisms of the tactile sense is basilar for manifold applications, like the development of artificial tactile sensors for intelligent prostheses or robotic assistants, and for the ergonomics. In this context, it is fundamental to realize appropriate dynamic analysis of the signals that characterize the characteristics of the contact. In other words, it is necessary to investigate the vibration spectrum measured on the finger, in order to identify the frequency range of measured spectra (that should correspond to the expected one given by the mechanoreceptors activation frequency range [2–500 Hertz]). An experimental set-up is developed to recover the contact global dynamics by detecting the contact force and the induced vibrations; the bench test has been designed to guarantee the measurements reproducibility and, at cause of the low amplitude of the vibrations of interest, to perform measurements without introducing external noise. In particular, in this paper, the interest will be focused on the changes shown in vibration spectra with respect to variations of the scanning velocity and surface roughness characteristics.Copyright

Coupling system dynamics and contact behaviour by numerical modelling at different scales

When dealing with mechanical systems including contact interfaces, two different mechanics at two different time and length scales have to be accounted for: the contact mechanics and the structural mechanics. The mechanics of the contact and the mechanics of structure are coupled by friction (forces and moments), local body deformations and wear (geometrical coupling). In the past, dynamic and tribological problems were treated separately and the analysis was focused either on the mechanism scales or on the contact scales, as a function of the problem. The analysis of the dynamic response of the mechanical system accounted for the contact interfaces thought global coefficients (global contact stiffness, damping, energy loss factor, etc.); vice versa, the analysis of the local behaviour at the contact interface accounted for the system dynamics imposing global boundary conditions on the contact model (pressure distribution, relative velocities, etc.). During last decades mechanical system design led to a power increase and to a drastic optimization, increasing as well the number of contact interfaces between deformable bodies. Thus, the need for coupling dynamic and tribological analyses arises for solving and understanding either wear phenomena or dynamic response of a mechanical system. On this sense, experimental tools showed their limits on the estimation and prediction of friction and wear phenomena. This paper proposes a first step toward a more general approach aimed to couple the dynamic analysis of the mechanism with the local tribological analysis at the contact, by the coupling of two different numerical models dealing with the two different scales. Two applications are then mentioned: the analysis of “false Brinelling” wear and the understanding of brake squeal instability.Copyright