A soft and lightweight fabric-based pneumatic interface for multimodal fingertip tactile feedback

TL;DR

This paper introduces a lightweight, fabric-based pneumatic fingertip device for realistic tactile feedback in VR and teleoperation, demonstrating high accuracy and untethered operation.

Contribution

It presents a novel fabric pneumatic actuator design that is soft, lightweight, and capable of multimodal tactile rendering for wearable haptic interfaces.

Findings

Device weighs only 2.1 g and operates untethered.

Achieves over 90% classification accuracy in tactile mode recognition.

Mechanical tests confirm sufficient force, displacement, and bandwidth.

Abstract

Wearable fingertip haptic devices are critical for realistic interaction in virtual reality, augmented reality, and teleoperation, yet existing approaches struggle to simultaneously achieve adequate tactile output, low mass, simple fabrication, and untethered portability. Here we show that fabric-based pneumatic actuation can address this gap. Our device comprises four pneumatic chambers fabricated from thermoplastic polyurethane-coated fabric via computer numerical control heat-sealing, yielding a soft, conformable interface weighing 2.1 g that operates untethered with a wrist-mounted control unit. Mechanical and dynamic characterization confirms that the fabric actuators produce sufficient force, displacement, and bandwidth for fingertip tactile rendering. A psychophysical study with 15 participants demonstrates classification accuracy exceeding 90% across three distinct tactile modes -- contact configuration, directional sliding, and vibrotactile frequency. These findings establish fabric-based pneumatic actuation as a viable technology route for lightweight, low-cost, and multimodal fingertip haptic interfaces.