Industry

Automotive

Force-feedback is used for simulating the operation necessary to manufacture the vehicles, long before the first prototypes are built. Car companies can reduce the technical risks, improve the assembly   processes, and in the end save time and money.

David Defianas, Virtual Reality Expert at PSA Peugeot Citroën: “We’re using   Haption force-feedback devices at our sites of Velizy and Sochaux. We simulate with them roughly 130 assembly processes a year. The investment has long paid off.” (Source: Interview @ Laval Virtual Conference, France, 2013)

Medical

Force-feedback is finding increasing use for training students on virtual patients. Our technology is also well suited as comanipulative robots, to help surgeons  perform surgeries or tele-surgeries.

Prof. E. Vander Poorten, from Robot Assisted Surgery (RAS) group of KU LEUVEN, uses Virtuose 6D linked to a VR environment to prototype new medical instruments, test haptic guidance schemes for comanipulated surgery and train surgeons, all within UCL-led GIFTSurg project.

In the nuclear industry, force-feedback is used to control robots remotely, so that operators are not exposed to radiations. AREVA uses robotic technologies in the  nuclear fuel management plants. They chose Virtuose 6D TAO for operations like in-service maintenance, clean-up and dismantling of facilities, used in their daily operations.

Aerospace

The aircraft industry also uses force-feedback for validating maintenance operations on future planes, in order to validate and optimize them. Because maintenance is a major factor of the operating costs of commercial planes, force-feedback  contributes to the companies competitiveness.

François Guillaume, AR/VR project manager at Airbus Group Innovations, said: “The Scale1 helps us to perform new operations in virtual reality. Totally       integrated our platforms SAMIRA and RHEA, we can simulate complex assembly operations with a really large workspace. While the team observes from a 3D stereoscopic screen, the user wears an HMD and the haptic system is totally transparent for him. He feels the collision in his hand, when the object touches or rubs against surrounding structures.”

Research             

Force-feedback is also an essential tool for scientific research. Research areas such as psychophysics, sports and health,  ergonomics, human-machine interaction, virtual reality, micro and nanotechnologies, need ways to transfer forces and movements between humans and machines.