Pouring from Deformable Containers using Dual-Arm Manipulation and Tactile Sensing

In this paper, we consider household robots that pour various contents from deformable containers. Such pouring is often seen in cooking and reusable containers of detergent. To achieve this kind of pouring, we follow a strategy to suppress the deformation of the container during pouring. We carefully design the grasping strategy: the palm of one hand supports the lower part of the deformable container and the other hand pulls up the upper part of the container. We apply the proposed system to pours four different kinds of contents: breakfast cereal, coffee beans, flour, and rice. The experiment verifies that the proposed system successfully pour the four contents. To evaluate the system quantitatively, we measure the deformation of the container using a motion capture system. We verify that the dual-arm pouring reduced the deformation by 66% compared to a single arm motion.