Haptic technologies for the conceptual and validation phases of product design

The paper presents two applications of haptic technologies to demonstrate how they can increase human computer interaction during different steps of design process. The first application aims at developing a system to generate digital shapes by manipulating haptic tools that resemble the physical ones that the modelers use in everyday work. The second is focused on the use of haptic interfaces to evaluate ergonomics of virtual products control boards. We designed and developed the mentioned haptic devices; the first uses two FCS HapticMaster equipped with a innovative strong and stiff 6 DOF device carrying simulated clay modeling tools. The second is an “ad hoc” mechatronic device able to simulate some controls with rotary motions (knobs). The described haptic devices are integrated in more complex virtual reality applications; the paper describes their architecture and the methodologies proposed to simulate material shaping and ergonomic validation. The main aspects of haptic modeling and rendering are also discussed.