LAUSR

The vortex gripper is a non-contact suction device that uses a high-speed rotating airflow to create a negative pressure and suction force. In this research, we studied the effect of the vortex gripper’s diameter on the maximum suction force and internal flow field. First, we proposed a simplified theoretical model of the maximum suction force and predicted the influences of changing the diameter. Then, we obtained the maximum suction forces of the grippers with different diameters through the experiment. Both the theoretical and experimental results show that changing the diameter of the vortex gripper increases the maximum suction force. However, with the increase in the diameter, the prediction of the trend of the maximum suction force is inconsistent with the experimental results. To analyze the difference between the theoretical and experimental results, we further measured the pressure distribution of the vortex gripper and calculated the pressure gradient. The pressure distribution showed that the maximum negative pressure decreases while the diameter increases, and there is a pressure platform, which dominates the central area of the chamber. Next, we indirectly obtained the circumferential velocity distribution based on the relationship between the pressure gradient and circumferential velocity. The results of the circumferential velocity distribution reveal that the high-speed rotating airflow only exists in the area near the inner wall of the vortex chamber, while the circumferential velocity in the central part of the vortex chamber is extremely slow. In addition, the results clarify that the inaccurate assumption of velocity distribution of the simplified theoretical model is the main cause of the theoretical prediction bias.