Robot end effector
device at the end of a robotic arm designed to interact with the environment
An end effector or tool head is the device at the end of a robotic arm designed to interact with the environment, typically a gripper or a tool. Its exact nature depends on the application of the robot.
Etymology
In the strict definition, which originates from serial robotic manipulators, the term denotes the last link (or 'end') of the robot. At this endpoint, the tools are attached. In a wider sense, an end effector can be seen as the part of a robot that interacts with the work environment. This does not refer to the wheels of a mobile robot or the feet of a humanoid robot, which are not end effectors but rather part of a robot's mobility.
Grippers
Categories
When referring to robotic prehension there are four general categories of robot grippers:
Impactive: jaws or claws which physically grasp by direct impact upon the object.
Ingressive: pins, needles or hackles which physically penetrate the surface of the object (used in textile, carbon, and glass fiber handling).
Astrictive: attractive forces applied to the object's surface (whether by pneumatic, magneto-, or electroadhesion).
Contigutive: requiring direct contact for adhesion to take place (such as glue, surface tension, or freezing).
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This entry incorporates text from “Robot end effector” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.