S.N.A.K.E.: A Dynamically Reconfigurable Artificial Sensate Skin ...

Figure 5-3: Strain Gage electronic calibration for gages 1 and 2 of node #004-3
voltage drop that decreases the total excitation voltage seen at the Wheatstone bridge and
this effect was intentionally ignored. Also, if the system is to be used in a wide range of
temperatures, then gages must be compensated for its effects; this is easily done though as
each node is equipped with a temperature sensor.
Data and Results
Once calibration is done, we can now proceed to show the data extracted from the skin.
Figure 5-4 shows some snapshots taken when data from strain gages one and two were being
sampled. Although no stimuli could be applied because of the mechanical problems previ-
ously mentioned, these are shown merely to demonstrate that raw data can be extracted
from both strain gages. Figure 5-4(a) corresponds to data extracted from strain gage 1 of
each node and Figure 5-5(c) corresponds to strain gage 2.
Although in the previous figures the strain gages were not submitted to a stimuli, their
response can be visualized in Figure 5-5. These plots were extracted from the two strain
gages of the node used for the calibration.
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