Abstract-Speeding up robot motion provides not only improvement in operating efficiency but also improves dexterous manipulation by taking advantage of an unstable state or noncontact state. In this paper we describe a hybrid trajectory generator that produces high-speed manipulation. This algorithm produces both mechanical high-speed motion and sensor-based reactive motion. As an example of high-speed manipulation, a robotic ball control in a batting task has been achieved. Performance evaluation is also analyzed.

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We developed a fingertip-size proximity sensor that detects the distance to and the tilt angle of the surface of an object with the peak-to-peak distance error less than 1/129th (<31 µm) and the measuring time less than 1/10th (<1 ms) those of existing sensors. In addition, we realized the task of catching a fragile object (paper balloon) with a high-speed robot hand equipped with the sensor. High-speed, high-precision sensing enables contact detection independently of the contact force. We describe a robust contact detection method that does not depend on the reflectance, the tilt angle, or the shape of target objects surface. In experiments, we confirmed that the sensor could measure a distance of 2.85-20 mm (resolution: 44 µm in <3 mm) and a tilt angle of ±45 • (error: 1.47 • ) for objects with reflectances of 18% and 90%. We demonstrated that the hand could catch the paper balloon when dropped from a height of about 20 cm without crushing it.