Quickstart: Before You Begin
Read this first. The Paxini Gen3 is a high-density pressure and force sensor — not a motion sensor. This page explains what it measures, which grippers it mounts on, connection options (USB-C or wireless), and what you will have running when you finish setup.
What the Paxini Gen3 Measures
The Paxini Gen3 is a high-density tactile pressure and force sensor system designed to mount on robotic fingertips, finger pads, or palms. This is an important distinction from motion sensors or force-torque wrist sensors:
- What it measures: Distributed contact pressure (spatial map), total contact force magnitude, contact area, and contact centroid location — at up to 500 Hz.
- What it does NOT measure: Joint angles, arm pose, or velocity. It does not know where the gripper is in space — only what forces are at the contact surface.
This means the Paxini Gen3 is a sensing modality that augments your robot's gripper, not a standalone controller. Its primary value is measuring the quality of contact during grasping — capturing slip events, contact area, and pressure distribution that cameras and proprioceptive sensors cannot observe.
The most important use case: Mount Gen3 sensors on your gripper fingertips, then record manipulation demonstrations. The tactile signal tells your policy whether a grasp is stable — information that vision alone cannot reliably provide, especially for deformable or transparent objects.
What Does It Mount On?
Paxini Gen3 uses an adhesive + screw-mount adapter system that fits any flat or curved fingertip surface. No custom machining required for standard grippers.
Orca Hand
Fingertip variant mounts directly on each Orca finger pad. Full-hand tactile sensing with 5 sensors synchronized over a single USB hub. Ideal for dexterous manipulation research.
RecommendedAllegro Hand
Fingertip and finger-pad variants attach to the flat facets of each Allegro finger. Adapter brackets available from Paxini. Works with both v3 and v4 hardware.
VerifiedRobotiq 2F-85 / 2F-140
Palm variant mounts on each finger face. Single-sensor setup covers the primary contact surface. Common in industrial pick-and-place and quality-inspection use cases.
VerifiedCustom / 3D-Printed Grippers
The adhesive mounting system works on any clean, flat surface. Sensor thickness is 2.1 mm — thin enough to embed in most custom fingertip designs without clearance issues.
CompatibleOpenArm + Gripper
Pair with any OpenArm-compatible gripper. The sensor data streams over USB alongside OpenArm joint data for synchronized recordings via the platform SDK.
SupportedStandalone Sensing
Use without a robot arm to study human manipulation, measure contact pressure during product testing, or collect grasp reference data for imitation learning.
SupportedUSB-C Wired and Wireless Options
The Paxini Gen3 supports two connection modes:
USB-C (Recommended)
Each sensor module connects via USB-C to the host PC or a USB hub mounted on the robot wrist. The sensor appears as a standard USB HID device — no driver installation required on any OS. Multiple sensors (e.g., all five fingers) connect through a USB 3.0 hub and appear as separate devices.
Round-trip latency from contact to Python callback is approximately 2–4 ms over USB-C at 500 Hz sampling. This is sufficient for detecting slip transients (<10 ms duration) in real time.
Wireless (BLE 5.2)
The Gen3 Wireless variant replaces the USB-C port with a BLE 5.2 radio and a 150 mAh rechargeable battery (8h runtime). Wireless sampling rate is limited to 200 Hz. Latency is approximately 10–15 ms, which is acceptable for data collection but not for real-time control loops.
For robot integration, use USB-C. Wireless is useful for human hand studies and bench testing. The cable management overhead on a robot arm is small — route the cable along the arm and secure with cable clips or spiral wrap.
How Long Does Setup Take?
Total time from unboxing to live tactile heatmap: approximately 1.5 hours for a single-sensor setup. Multi-finger setups add 20–30 minutes per additional sensor.
Total standalone setup: ~35 minutes. Integration with a robot arm for synchronized recording adds another 45 minutes for wiring, cable management, and timestamp verification.
Hardware Checklist
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Paxini Gen3 Sensor Module (fingertip, finger-pad, or palm variant) Specify your gripper when ordering — Paxini ships the appropriate mounting adapter in the box. Contact SVRC for pricing →
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USB-C cable (0.5 m, included) or USB hub for multi-sensor setups Each sensor uses one USB-C port. For a 5-finger setup, use a powered USB 3.0 hub mounted at the robot wrist to minimize cable bundle size.
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Mounting adapter for your target gripper Included in the box for Orca Hand, Allegro, and Robotiq 2F series. For custom grippers, use the universal adhesive mount (included) or request a custom bracket.
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Host PC — any OS (macOS, Linux, Windows) Python 3.10+. No custom driver required — sensor enumerates as a standard USB HID device. Linux recommended for robot arm integration (ROS2).
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Robot arm or gripper (for full integration) Any compatible arm: OpenArm, Franka, UR series, custom. The sensor works standalone for bench testing but requires an arm for the full data collection pipeline.