Using some skin safe adhesive tape, True Tape, I stuck some pieces of tape to the end effector and tested how well it would stretch the skin.
One major benefit that the tape has over other adhesive materials is that it would require virtually no normal force to apply the skin stretch, as you can see in the photo below, it sticks to the skin quite well. Also, it is un-noticeable when it is not in use, and simply stuck to the skin. I left one tactor on my arm and forgot to take it off, and did not notice it was still attached to my arm until someone else pointed it out.
Here is it actually stretching the skin on my hand
pros |
cons |
*no slipping *no normal force *easy to apply |
*may hurt when detaching from a hairy arm *has a weird tingling feeling when stretching *need to re-apply the tape after each use *if the tape slips or detaches, there is no way to re-apply the skin stretch using the same piece of tape |