A 3D printing flexure pressure sensor for robot impact safety testing

This paper presents a flexure pressure sensor fabricated by means of 3D printing. This sensor combined with a biosimulant artifact from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is used to measure the severity of injuries caused in the case of a robot impact with a human. The stiffness matrix is derived for the structure by means of screw theory. A Finite Element (FE) model is constructed to verify the analytical model and obtain the allowable pressure with regard to the yield stress.