Fabric manipulation utilizing contacts with the environment

This paper presents a method of fabric manipulation utilizing contacts with rigid environment. During its manipulation, the fabric can be replaced and deformed favorably by the contacts. We first show that a single-handed manipulator can deal with a rectangular piece of fabric by utilizing the environment. We discuss in detail a motion involving placing, one of the basic tasks in fabric manipulation. We also describe a wiping motion, involving ways to deform and replace fabrics, as an application of fabric manipulations utilizing contacts with rigid environment.