The paper presents an innovative prehensor developed within the European project EUROShoE. This prehensor enables multi-point grasp, firm hold and a gentle transfer of limp items. It is the end-effector of a high-speed manipulator, serving and cooperating with other manufacturing units. Shoe and clothing industries aim today at a dramatic renovation of the concept of the goods from mass produced to mass customised. They are a good benchmark for virtual engineering techniques, which are the base of interdisciplinary concurrent design of manufacturing systems for agile enterprise. Following this approach, the prehensor design process availed of fully implemented digital mock-ups and run extended virtual trims to accomplish dynamic analysis as stand-alone device and as integrated end-effector of a robotic system. The design methodology has assured low inertia, high modularity and full flexibility, adapting to the picking of all the templates of the reference shoe production. A prototype of the prehensor has been realised and early performance tests done.
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