Design and testing of SensHB.Q: a cost-effective force-sensitive interface to drive mobile motorized systems

This study focuses on the development and testing of SensHB.Q, a force-sensitive interface for driving omnidirectional motorized systems such as wheelchairs, precision agriculture rovers, hospital beds, mobile service robots, and heavy-duty platforms. As manual driving is still fundamental in transportation vehicles, the design of intuitive driving interfaces has a major impact on the user experience. Force-sensitive interfaces measure the forces and torques applied by the driver on a sensitive area of the device and then convert these force inputs into commands for the omnidirectional system. In this paper, the design of the SensHB.Q force-sensitive interface and the transfer function for converting force inputs into speed commands are presented. Experimental tests are then conducted to validate the effectiveness of this interface in controlling two omnidirectional motorized systems: MoviWE.Q electrically powered wheelchair and Agrimaro.Q rover for precision agriculture in greenhouses.