Article

Karla: A Simple and Affordable 3-D Printed Body-Powered

Prosthetic Hand with Versatile Gripping Technology
Ardianto Satriawan 1, * , Wildan Trusaji 2 , Dradjad Irianto 2 , Isa Anshori 1 , Casi Setianingsih 3, *,
Erza Nurtriandari 4 and Rachmat Zulkarnain Goesasi 4

1 School of Electrical Engineering and Informatics, Institut Teknologi Bandung, Jl. Ganesha No. 10,
Bandung 40132, Indonesia
2 Faculty of Industrial Technology, Institut Teknologi Bandung, Jl. Ganesha No. 10, Bandung 40132, Indonesia
3 School of Electrical Engineering, Telkom University, Jl. Telekomunikasi No. 1, Bandung 40257, Indonesia
4 Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Padjadjaran-Dr. Hasan
Sadikin General Hospital, Bandung 40161, Indonesia
* Correspondence: [email protected] (A.S.); [email protected] (C.S.)

Abstract: Losing a hand can significantly impact an individual’s physical and emotional well-being.
Prosthetic hands can help restore some function and independence for individuals who have lost a
hand. However, the prosthetic hands available on the market are prohibitively expensive, especially
for developing countries, such as Indonesia. Commercial electronically powered prosthetic hands can
be expensive, having prices ranging from $25,000 to $75,000 and annual maintenance costs ranging
from $500 to $3000. In contrast, body-powered prosthetic hands are generally cheaper, ranging from
$2000 to $10,000, but are still considered expensive for many people in developing countries. To make
prosthetic hands more accessible, we have designed a body-powered prosthetic hand, “Karla”, using
affordable materials and with as few components as possible. This report presents our proposed
designs, the innovations, the parts in detail, and experiences using the designed prosthetic hand. The
highlight of our design is a novel whippletree-like mechanism that utilizes the 3-D space to contract
the fingers of the prosthetic hand.

Citation: Satriawan, A.; Trusaji, W.;

Keywords: prosthetic hand; body-powered prosthesis; whippletree-like mechanism
Irianto, D.; Anshori, I.; Setianingsih,
C.; Nurtriandari, E.; Goesasi, R.Z.
Karla: A Simple and Affordable 3-D
Printed Body-Powered Prosthetic
Hand with Versatile Gripping
1. Introduction
Technology. Designs 2023, 7, 37. Losing a hand can be traumatic, as it can significantly impact an individual’s physical
https://doi.org/10.3390/ and emotional well-being. It can be difficult to adjust to the loss of a hand, particularly
designs7020037 if the amputated hand was dominant, as it can affect an individual’s ability to perform
activities of daily living (ADL) [1]. The loss of a hand can also have a significant emotional
Academic Editor: Mahdi Bodaghi
impact, as it can affect an individual’s self-esteem and sense of self [2].
Received: 27 December 2022 One of the tools to help a patient with such conditions is a prosthetic hand, which can
Revised: 17 February 2023 help restore some of the function and independence that may have been lost [3]. The use of
Accepted: 28 February 2023 prosthetic hands can increase the confidence and capabilities of a prosthetic hand user, his
Published: 2 March 2023 engagement in activities, and his enjoyment in work [4].
There are two types of prosthetic hands: passive and active. A passive prosthetic
hand is an artificial hand designed to replace a missing hand cosmetically without any
Copyright: © 2023 by the authors.
additional functions (static or cosmetic prosthesis) or with limited functionality (adjustable
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
prosthesis) [5]. The main advantage of this type of prosthetic hand is its affordability and
This article is an open access article simplicity. It is also relatively easy to use and maintain [6]. An active prosthetic hand, while
distributed under the terms and more expensive, offers significantly greater functionality by mimicking the function of a
conditions of the Creative Commons natural hand. It typically consists of a series of mechanical joints which allow the prosthetic
Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// hand to move and grasp objects [7].
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ There are two categories of active prosthetic hands: body-powered and externally
4.0/). powered prosthetic hands. Body-powered prosthetic hands are devices that are controlled

Designs 2023, 7, 37. https://doi.org/10.3390/designs7020037 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/designs

Designs 2023, 7, 37 2 of 15

by the movement of the user’s own body. They often utilize a cable system. The user moves
other body parts to actuate the prosthetic hand. This type of prosthetic can be more durable
and require less maintenance. Externally powered prosthetic hands use sensors to detect
muscle movements or signals from the user’s body, which are then used to control the
actuation of the prosthetic hand. Some electronically powered prosthetic hands can also
allow the user to feel sensory feedback, such as touch or pressure, through the embedding
of specific sensors [8].
In Indonesia and many developing countries, the cost is one significant problem for
an amputee in purchasing an active hand prosthesis [9–11]. A commercial electronically
powered prosthetic hand can cost from 25,000 to 75,000 US dollars [12], which is certainly
unaffordable for most people in a developing country. The annual maintenance costs range
from 500 to 3000 US dollars [13], making them even more unaffordable. A body-powered
prosthetic hand, typically sold at 2000 to 10,000 US dollars, is cheaper [12]. However, they
are still expensive.
We designed a body-powered prosthetic hand using affordable materials to solve this
problem. We also designed the device to have as few components as possible, making it
affordable to the amputees while still offering a grasping functionality by pulling a rope
using the other hand. We successfully tried our designed prosthetic hand to grasp various
objects such as tissues, marbles, LEGO blocks, credit cards, keys, poker chips, pens, and
USB cables. This paper explains our thinking in the design process, each part of the design,
the analysis, and our experiences using the designed prosthetic hands. We named our
design Karla.
The advantage of our designed hand for us is the materials: ABS for 3-D printing,
gloves, ropes, and all other materials can be obtained locally. From Bandung, West Java,
Indonesia, we obtained all the materials locally. The assembly and manufacturing processes
were also performed locally in the city. We also support the repair and maintenance of our
prosthetic hand.
The rest of the paper is organized as follows: Section 2 reviews previous works
on affordable body-powered prosthetic hands by other researchers. Section 3 presents
the proposed design, detailed explanations of each part, and also design justifications.
Then, Section 4 describes the results of the designs, media sightings, and our competition
experiences. Section 5 compares our work to similar works. Finally, Section 6 concludes
the paper.

2. Related Inventions
Our design uses a force distribution mechanism to distribute the pulling force from the
user to all five fingers. There are some patents and inventions that are similar to our work.
Belter et al. [14], under US patent number 20170049583, designed a prototype that uses
intertwined ropes to distribute the forces to the fingers. However, the thumb is not a part
of the grasping mechanism and is only used cosmetically.
The design of Trusaji et al. [15], under Indonesian patent number P00202007576, uses
a triangle-shaped link which has a shape similar to a pulley on both of its ends. However,
that design distributes force only to the four fingers, as there is no thumb attached.
Aleksandrovich [16], under Russian patent RU2664171C1, proposed a balancing mech-
anism using two linked pulleys arranged in parallel and connected by a rod, which is
linked to a pulley with a series arrangement. The five fingers, including the thumb, are
linked to the balancing mechanism in the patent. Nevertheless, the parallel and series
arrangement of the three pulleys complicates the component assembly process within the
prosthetic hand’s limited space. The structure also causes the thumb to bend first, before
the other four fingers.
In a healthy hand, humans either move the five fingers simultaneously, or the four
fingers first before the thumb when grasping something unconsciously. We designed a
system that tries to emulate the simultaneous movements of the five fingers to create an
adaptive grasp.
Designs 2023, 7, 37 3 of 15

3. System Design
Our design consists of three main parts: the force distributor, the main hand, and the
finger mechanism. The force distributor uses ropes to distribute the pulling force from the
user to all five fingers. The main hand consists of a palm, a fourth metacarpus, and a fifth
to accommodate the grasped object’s contours and shapes. The fingers use pulleys that act
as the joints, elastic rope as the extensor muscle tendon, and non-elastic rope as the flexor
muscle tendon. Figure 1 illustrates our designed prosthetic hand’s overall top-view block
diagram, showing a right-hand design.

Figure 1. Overallblock diagram of Karla. The design consists of three parts: a force distributor, the
main hand, and fingers. To make a grasping motion, the user pulls the main string with force Farm .

Figure 2 shows the detailed parts of our designed prosthetic hand. The parts labeled 1
to 5 are the force distribution subsystem, parts 6 to 8 are the main hand subsystem, and
parts 9 to 13 are the fingers subsystem. We will explain the design of each part in the
following subsections.
Designs 2023, 7, 37 4 of 15

Figure 2. Complete illustration of the design: (1) Main rope. (2) Force distributor. (3) Thumb rope.
(4) Index and middle finger rope. (5) Ring and little finger rope. (6) Palm. (7) Fifth metacarpus. (8) Fourth
metacarpus. (9) Thumb. (10) Index finger. (11) Middle finger. (12) Ring finger. (13) Little finger.

3.1. Force Distributor

The main idea of our hand design was to minimize the number of parts and actuators
to use as few components as possible. We designed a system to transform a simple pull of
the main rope into a grasping motion. One of the most crucial subsystems in a prosthetic
hand device is the one distributing the pulling force into each finger.

3.1.1. Force Distributor Review

Designing a force distribution system is not an easy task [17]. One of the solutions
is using a whippletree-like mechanism. A whippletree is a mechanical device used in
horse-drawn vehicles to transfer the pulling force of the horses to the vehicle. It consists of
a series of bars or rods hinged together, with one end attached to the horses’ harnesses and
the other end attached to the vehicle. The design allows the horses to pull in a straight line
rather than at an angle, which helps to distribute the force more evenly and reduces strain
on the horses.
The most common of this whippletree mechanism examples is a two-horse team for
pulling a carriage. In the two-horse team, three bars are used to distribute a force between
two horses to share the work evenly. This arrangement is sometimes known as a double-
tree. Figure 3 illustrates the basic elements of the whippletree and double-tree arrangement
schematic in the two-horses team.

Figure 3. Whippletree mechanism: (a) basic element of whippletree mechanism and (b) a double-tree
arrangement in a two-horse team.

In the hand prosthesis design, a whippletree-like mechanism is very useful to minimize

the number of actuators. Instead of controlling each finger with multiple actuators, the
whippletree mechanism distributes forces evenly from one actuator to the fingers. Thus,
Designs 2023, 7, 37 5 of 15

the whippletree mechanism can mechanically adjust the movement of fingers according to
the shape of the object. This feature is achieved by regulating the force transmission into
each finger based on the amount of resistance given by the object to each finger.
There are a few previously designed prosthetic hands that use whippletree-like mech-
anisms. A prosthetic hand designed by Groenewegen [18] uses a mechanism called a
whippletree to allow for an adaptable grasping function. This mechanism consists of seven
bars, three triangle-shaped bars, and nine pins arranged in a double-tree configuration. All
of these components were 3-D printed. The design of Groenewegen’s whippletree is shown
in Figure 4.

Figure 4. Whippletree mechanism proposed by Groenewegen [18].

Makerhand [19] proposed a prosthetic hand that has a unique approach. It has only
three fingers, including the thumb. The three-finger configuration arose since it considers
the most basic whippletree arrangement, which consists of only one bar and four lines.
The design only uses one bar and three lines to achieve a whippletree mechanism for its
prosthetic hand. The line from three fingers is attached to each tip of the bar and the center
of the bar. Figure 5 illustrates the schematic of Makerhand’s whippletree mechanism.

Figure 5. Whippletree mechanism proposed by Makerhand [19].

Esposito et al. [20] proposed the "Federica" hand, which uses multiple pulleys and
ropes to implement its whippletree mechanism to distribute force to all five fingers. How-
ever, the numbers of pulleys and ropes make the force distributed to the fingers uneven
and less than ideal. Figure 6 shows the pulley-whippletree configurations of Federica.
Designs 2023, 7, 37 6 of 15

Figure 6. "Federica"’s whippletree mechanism using a multiple-pulley system [20].

3.1.2. Force Distribution Design

Learning from the disadvantages of the previous whippletree systems [18–20] that
only used less than five fingers, sacrificing the amount of force distributed to the fingers, or
using too many parts, we designed a system that is able to:
1. Distribute the force to all the fingers;
2. Maximize the force distributed to the fingers.
Our design was inspired by the pulley-and-rope system. However, one of our goals
was to minimize the number of parts. Therefore, we replaced the pulley with a pin-based
whippletree system. The initial design of this idea in 2-dimensional space can only work
with four fingers without an additional bar for the thumb. Keeping in mind that minimizing
the number of parts is our priority, we exploited the 3-dimensional space to add a pin for the
thumb. This design only needs one bar. Figure 7 shows the initial design in 2-dimensional
space and 3-dimensional space for the addition of the thumb.

Figure 7. (a) Our initial design in 2-dimensional space and (b) 3-dimensional space design for the
accommodation of the thumb.

We then simplify the design of the bar as a propeller or fidget-spinner-like shape, as

shown in Figure 8. This simplification is done to get a more symmetrical and balanced
shape while also reducing the number of small pins or holes. The edge of the balancer acts
as the second pin for both index–middle-finger and ring–little-finger pairs.
We call this novel force-balancing whippletree-like mechanism Versatile Gripping
Technology (VGT) which we patented at the Indonesian Patent Office [21]. However,
this whippletree connector also has a disadvantage: it requires more space and larger
arm sockets.
Designs 2023, 7, 37 7 of 15

Figure 8. Propeller or fidget-spinner-like whippletree bar. The numbering (2) follows the conventions
in Figure 2. The hole (2A) and the edge of the design are used for the "pin" for the ring and little
fingers. The hole (2B) is for the thumb. The hole (2C) works similarly to (2A) but for the index and
middle finger. The hole (2D) is for the main rope to the arm direction.

3.2. Main Hand

The next important subsystem is the main hand, which consists of three parts: the
palm, the fourth metacarpus, and the fifth metacarpus. We chose this mechanism to
facilitate a spherical grip by simulating the upper part of palmar creases. Together, they
form the main hand subsystem that can adapt to the grasped object shape. Figure 9 shows
the integrated isometric view of both the force distributor and the main hand subsystem.

Figure 9. The isometric view of the force distributor system (1–5) and main hand systems: (6) palm,
(7) fifth metacarpus and (8) fourth metacarpus.

They also have an important role in the rope routing for distributing and directing the
pulling force, especially for the thumb. The thumb is a special feature because it rotates
in the yaw direction while the other fingers rotate in the pitch direction. Therefore, it is
attached to the side of the palm and requires special routing. Figure 10 illustrates the
back view of the palm. We also marked the holes where we inserted the ropes from the
force-distribution mechanism.
Designs 2023, 7, 37 8 of 15

Figure 10. The back view of the palm. The holes are for inserting the rope into the channels and
are connected to each finger. The (6A) hole is for the thumb; and the holes 6B–6E are for the index,
middle, ring, and little fingers, respectively.

Figure 11 shows the inner palm channels of each finger. The palm is connected directly
to the thumb, index finger, and middle finger. For the ring and little finger, we first
route the rope to additional parts—the fourth and fifth metacarpals—to accommodate an
adaptive grasp.

Figure 11. The top and left views of the palm show the routing channels, marked in dashed lines.
Channel (6A) is for the thumb, channels (6B) and (6C) are directly connected to the fingers, channel
(6D) is connected to the fourth metacarpus, and channel (6E) is connected to the fifth metacarpus.

In the fourth and fifth metacarpal parts, the palm ropes go to their channels before
finally being connected to the ring and little fingers. Figure 12 shows the routing channels
of the aforementioned parts.
Using this main hand design, we can distribute the pulling force to all the connected
fingers while providing an adaptive grasp by adding flexible fourth and fifth metacarpal
parts. The rope is then connected to the fingers, which we discuss in the following section.

3.3. Fingers’ Mechanism

We surveyed a few possible mechanisms for the fingers’ mechanism: the compliant
mechanism [22], 4-bar linkage [23], and pulley–line mechanism [24]. We then compared
the advantages and disadvantages of each mechanism. Table 1 shows the pros and cons list
for each mechanism.
Designs 2023, 7, 37 9 of 15

Figure 12. (a) The routing channel (7A) for the fourth metacarpus and (b) the routing channel (8A)
for the fifth metacarpus.

Table 1. Advantages and disadvantages of fingers’ mechanism.

Mechanism Advantages Disadvantages

Compliant mechanism [22] - No moving part - Prone to fatigue
- Materials are difficult to obtain
- Expensive to manufacture
4-bar linkage [23] - High reliability - Consists of many small
customized parts
- Hard to assembly
Pulley-line [24] - Low-cost - Ropes prone to frictions
- Materials available locally - Ropes need regular maintenance
- Similar to actual human
fingers mechanism

We chose to use the fingers’ mechanism based on what we value most in our de-
sign: cost, availability, and simplicity. We decided to use the pulley–line mechanism in
our design.
Each of the ropes from the main hand mechanism is connected to each finger. In this
part, the mechanism uses two pulleys, three rods, an elastic rope, and a non-elastic rope.
The non-elastic ropes are the continuation of the rope from the main hand. Figure 13 shows
how we arrange the rods, pulleys, and ropes in their resting state.

Figure 13. The arrangement of the rods, pulleys, and ropes inside the fingers. The elastic rope is
shown in red, and the non-elastic pullable rope is shown in green.
Designs 2023, 7, 37 10 of 15

The two pulleys act as the metacarpophalangeal (MP) joint and distal-interphalangeal
(DIP) joint. The elastic rope acts as the extensor muscle tendon, and the non-elastic rope
acts as the flexor muscle tendon. When the flexor rope is pulled by the forces, Fr , from
the main hand, the fingers will make a grasping motion, and the extensor rope will be
stretched, as shown in Figure 14.

Figure 14. The finger mechanism in the grasping position after a pulling force (Fr ) is applied.

When the pulling force is released, the elasticity of the extensor rope will force the
fingers back to their resting positions. For simplicity of the production, we also designed
the thumb with three knuckles, unlike a real hand, in which the thumb only has two
knuckles. The finger mechanisms are then packaged into finger-like detachable parts, as
shown in Figure 2.

3.4. Prototype Production and Packaging

We used 3-D printing technologies to make the non-moving parts of our design, which
consist of the force distributor, palm, fourth and fifth metacarpal bones, and the fingers’
parts: rods and pulleys. The complete hand was then covered in a textured leather glove to
increase friction and make it easier to grasp objects.
All the designing of parts was done in Blender (https://www.blender.org/, accessed
on: 1 December 2022),and the material used for 3-D printing was acrylonitrile butadiene
styrene (ABS). The main pulling rope was made of a Bowden cable, the elastic rope for
the fingers tendon was a crafting elastic rope, and the non-elastic rope was made of a
high-grade fishing line. Table 2 shows our bill of materials for our design.
We also designed a casing for the lower and upper arms [25], which we designed
to give a comfortable feeling to the user. Figure 15 shows the complete packaging of our
design for the right hand. We also produced a left-handed version of the prototype.

Figure 15. The complete prosthetic hand after packaging, showing a right-hand design.
Designs 2023, 7, 37 11 of 15

Table 2. Bill of materials.

Part Designator Quantity Note Materials

Balancer Force distributor 1 unit Manually cut to Figure 8 shape 2-mm aluminium sheet
Main Hand Palm 1 unit 3-D printed ABS, 20% infill, 2 mm layer, 65 gram
Fourth metacarpus 1 unit 3-D printed ABS, 20% infill, 2 mm layer, 65 gram
Fourth metacarpus 1 unit 3-D printed ABS, 20% infill, 2 mm layer, 65 gram
Finger knuckles Distal phalanx 5 units 3-D printed ABS, 20% infill, 2 mm layer, 40 gram
Middle phalanx 5 units 3-D printed ABS, 20% infill, 2 mm layer, 40 gram
Proximal phalanx 5 units 3-D printed ABS, 20% infill, 2 mm layer, 40 gram
Ropes Non-elastic rope 8 units For inner channels (3 units) and finger High-grade fishing line
tendons (5 units)
Elastic rope 5 units For finger tendons ABS, 20% infill, 2 mm layer, 40 gram
Main rope 1 unit For main pulling rope Bowden cable or bicycle brake cable.
Rivets Rivets 18 units As fastener between parts 4 × 11 mm rivets
Glove Glove 1 unit To increase the friction for a better grip Elastic, leather, and high-grip glove.
We use a mountain-biking glove.

4. Results and Performance Evaluations

The evaluate the grasping capabilities of our design, we used the Southampton Hand
Assessment Procedure (SHAP) [26], which is a standardized assessment tool used to evalu-
ate the function of the hands and upper extremities of individuals with hand impairments
or disabilities.
We tried the design to grip various objects by performing tip gripping, lateral gripping,
tripod gripping, spherical gripping, power gripping, and extension gripping. Figure 16
shows our pilot, a left-hand amputee wearing our left-hand prototype version, ready to
grasp various objects: a cylinder, a smartphone, a pen, a USB stick, a jar lid, a credit card, a
triangular prism, and an egg-shaped object.

Figure 16. Our pilot wearing a left-handed version of Karla, ready to try grasping various objects.

Our pilot was capable of driving our design to form various grips according to the
SHAP: a power grip by holding the cylinder, a tip grip by holding a marble, an extension
grip by holding a smartphone, and a spherical grip by holding an egg-shaped object.
Figure 17 shows our documentation of our pilot holding various objects. The limitation
Designs 2023, 7, 37 12 of 15

of our technology is it can not form a tripod grip, which a healthy hand typically makes
when writing. However, we would argue that, in our case, a tripod grip can be replaced
by a tip grip for holding objects such as pens. This is also supported by the fact that our
prosthetic hand is not designed to perform complex movement tasks, such as writing or
eating with chopsticks.

(a) (c) (e)

(b) (d) (f)

Figure 17. Grasping various objects using our designed hand: (a) power grip, (b) tip grip, (c) tip grip
as tripod grip replacement, (d) extension grip, (e) lateral grip, and (f) spherical grip.

We conclude that our design worked as intended: providing an affordable body-

powered prosthetic hand that is affordable; simple to use—by just pulling the main rope, it
will produce a grasping motion; uses a minimum number of parts; is easily prototyped;
and can be mass-produced locally. In the city where we are located, we can obtain all the
materials at an affordable price, and we have access to 3-D printing facilities that can fulfill
our production demand. The overall production cost of our design is less than $1000, which
is still in the affordable range.
To test our design further, we participated in the Cybathlon Challenge 2022, a hand
prosthetic race competition held by ETH Zürich, Switzerland, on 17 May 2022. The competi-
tors were asked to move various objects from one table to another with obstacles against
time. All participants were then sorted by their time. Our pilot won third place in the
competition, as shown in Figure 18 [27,28].

(a) (b)

Figure 18. Our pilot won third place in the Cyabathlon Challenge 2022 organized by ETH Zürich,
Switzerland: (a) the pilot proudly showing his time, and (b) final standings in the competition.
Designs 2023, 7, 37 13 of 15

We also collected testimonial from our user about the use of our prototype in daily life:
• It can help with daily necessities, such as sweeping the floor, putting the laundry on a
drying rack; and also can help with playing sports confidently.
• It can be a starting point for a conversation in a public place, such as a train or bus,
which helps in gaining more confidence.

5. Comparison to Other Works

There are many well-developed branches of 3-D printed prosthetic hand that have
been researched before. To assess our contributions to existing research, we compare the
advantages and disadvantages of our design to similar prototypes available. Table 3 shows
the advantages and disadvantages compared to other prosthetic hands.

Table 3. Comparison to other prosthetic hands.

Designs Advantages Disadvantages

Arm V2 [29] Whippletree mechanism can be assembled inside the Thumb not included in the whippletree mechanism,
palm. thus it moves independently from the other four
fingers.
Bionic Flexy Arm [30] Aesthetically pleasing Whippletree mechanism does not available, making it
hard for users to grip various shaped objects.
NIOP Kwawu Remix [31] Whippletree mechanism can be assembled inside the The thumb is not included in the whippletree
palm, capable of inward and outward rolling. mechanism, making it moves independently from the
fingers.
Unlimbited Arm v2.1 [32] Aesthetically pleasing, especially for children. No whippletree mechanism, hence not capable of
flexible gripping.
Prótesis personalizada Aesthetically pleasing, feminine design. No whippletree for versatile gripping.
Cinderella [33]
Karla (Ours) All the fingers are included in the whippletree The whippletree mechanism has a 3-D shape and
mechanism, making it capable of grasping movement, therefore it needs more room and space in
various shapes. the forearm, near the wrist.

6. Conclusions and Future Works

In this paper, we presented a simple and affordable prosthetic hand, which we named
Karla. The design provides an affordable body-powered prosthetic hand that is affordable,
simple, uses a minimum number of parts, and is easily produced. The designed hand,
Karla, is capable of creating five of six grips in the SHAP hand assessment: the power grip,
tip grip, extension grip, lateral grip, and spherical grip.
We also see an opportunity to develop a future design improvement. In our present
design, the main actuator is a rope pulled by the user’s healthy hand. We are currently
working on developing a sensor–actuator system that is able to electronically or mechani-
cally pull the main rope of the system by trying various sensors, such as electromyography
(EMG) sensors and force-sensitive resistors (FSR), and then processing the signals into
meaningful data that can control a servo motor to pull the main rope.

Author Contributions: This work was realized through the collaboration of all authors. Conceptu-
alization, W.T., E.N. and R.Z.G.; methodology, W.T.; investigation, W.T. and A.S.; resources, W.T.,
D.I., A.S. and C.S.; data curation, A.S.; writing—original draft preparation, A.S.; writing—review
and editing, A.S.; visualization, A.S.; supervision, D.I. and C.S.; project administration, W.T. and
I.A.; funding acquisition, W.T., A.S., I.A. and C.S. All authors have read and agreed to the published
version of the manuscript.
Funding: The study was the result of start-up funding of "Lembaga Pengembangan Inovasi dan
Kewirausahaan (LPIK)" of Institut Teknologi Bandung (ITB).
Data Availability Statement: Not available.
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Designs 2023, 7, 37 14 of 15

Abbreviations
The following abbreviations are used in this manuscript:

DIP Distal-interphalangeal
EMG Electromyography
FSR Force-sensitive resistor
MP Metacarpophalangeal
SHAP Southampton Hand Assessment Procedure
VGT Versatile Gripping Technology

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