Sandia Hand to enable cost effective IED detonation

A cost effective robotic hand for use in detonation of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) have been developed by Sandia National Laboratories, with funding support from the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).

Created by principal investigator Curt Salisbury, the hand aims to address challenges, such as cost, durability and modularity that prevented universal use of other robotic hands, and is also dexterous enough to simulate the capabilities of a human hand.

Sandia senior manager Philip Heermann said, ”Current iterations of robotic hands can cost more than $250,000. We need the flexibility and capability of a robotic hand to save human lives, and it needs to be priced for wide distribution to troops.”

The modular configuration of hand allows rapid joining of different types of fingers with magnets to form a hand frame, and also provides user with flexibility to quickly attach additional fingers or other devices, such as flashlights, screwdrivers or cameras.

In case of an accident, the fingers are designed to fall off and can be easily put back in their sockets, rather than breaking the complete hand.

Salisbury said, ”In addition, if a finger pops off, the robot can actually pick it up with the remaining fingers, move into position and resocket the finger by itself.”

A gel-like layer present on the robot’s outer skin offers an additional advantage for safe grabbing and manipulation of objects, similar to a human hand. The robot is also expected to provide a clue about bomb makers themselves.

”The Sandia Hand has 12 degrees of freedom, and is estimated to retail for about $800 per degree of freedom — $10,000 total — in low-volume production,” Salisbury said.

Sandia worked with Stanford University scientists for hardware development, and also with consulting firm, LUNAR, to lower the unit costs.