Effectiveness of Distributed Pressure and Slippage Force Presentation in Tactile Virtual Reality

In pervious virtual reality systems, haptic presentation devices have already been developed and their usage discussed. However, the combination effects of distributed pressure and slippage force sensations have not been investigated in spite of their possibilities for virtual reality systems. In this study, we developed a mouse capable of presenting combined stimulation to discuss the combination effects on virtual reality. The mouse was equipped with a bimorph-piezoelectric-actuator-array and a two-dimensional electro-magnetic-linear-motor to present pressure and slippage force, respectively. In order to evaluate the presentation accuracy of the mouse, we performed a series of tracing experiments of virtual figure contours. Since the deviation errors of the combination presentation were smaller than that of pressure presentation only, the combination presentation was effective for virtual reality because of the edge tracing easiness induced by the slippage force used on the edges.