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ForceBoard™ Tactile Tester - Tactile friction & Sense of touch measurements

ForceBoard™ Tactile Tester is the world's most powerful tactile friction tester for haptic perception measurements. Place an object or surface on ForceBoard™ and swipe your finger over it and objectively measure and record what the surface feels like via the interacting normal and friction forces and hereby quantify the sense of touch! Our latest version even tracks the position and speed of your finger via our unique force point tracking (FPT) technology!

Sense of touch and tactile friction testing example

ForceBoard Mobile Phone Test 3.png

Tactile friction measurement between finger and a rough aluminium surface with position and speed tracking of the finger

Tactility optimization and tactile friction are growing branches of product development aimed at optimizing the feel of surfaces found in medical devices, consumer products, skin care products, hair care products and mobile devices. Tactile friction data can also be used to mimic a material or fine tune an artificial sensation generated by a secondary electronic device.

 

Machine learning algorithms can also be incorporated into our software ForceBoard Analyzer to detect "good" and "bad" surfaces.

White papers:

 

2011 Alejandra León, Matilda Kaba-Liljeberg, Tactility in fabrics of clothing - A tactile study of silk, cotton and wool, Bachelor Thesis, KTH Royal Institute of Technology

 

2011 Natalia Chuvashova, Development of a hiking aid with focus on the user and tactility, Master Thesis, KTH Royal Institute of Technology

 

2012 Lisa Skedung, Tactile Perception - Role of Friction and Texture, ISSN: 1654-1081, Doctoral Thesis, KTH Royal Institute of Technology.

2015 Stéphanie Bernatchez, Stephen Theiss et al. Reducing Friction on Skin at Risk: The Use of 3M™ Cavilon™ No Sting Barrier Film https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4651030/

 

2016 Kenneth Duvefelt, Adhesion and Friction - a Study on Tactility, ISSN: 1400-1179, Doctoral Thesis, KTH Royal Institute of Technology.

2017 Martin Arvidsson, Lovisa Ringstad, Lisa Skedung, Kenneth Duvefelt, Mark Rutland, Feeling fine - the effect of topography and friction on perceived roughness and slipperiness

2018 Lisa Skedung, Charles El Rawadi, Martin Arvidsson, Mark Rutland, Céline Farcet, Gustavo Luengo (L'Oréal), Lionel Breton (L'Oréal), Mechanisms of tactile sensory deterioration amongst the elderly

 

2018 Lisa Skedung, Kathryn Harris, Elizabeth S. Collier, Martin Arvidsson, Anelila Waeckerlin, Walter Haag, Marco Bieri, Andriy Romanyuk, Mark W. Rutland,  Feeling Smooth: Psychotribological Probing of Molecular Composition

2020 Lisa Skedung, Kathryn L. Harris, Elizabeth S. Collier1, Mark W. Rutland The finishing touches: the role of friction and roughness in haptic perception of surface coatings

2021 A Sticky Situation or Rough Going? Influencing Haptic Perception of Wood Coatings Through Frictional and Topographical Design | SpringerLink

 

2021 A Curly Q: Is Frizz a Matter of Friction? - Lisa Skedung, Elizabeth S. Collier, Kathryn L. Harris, Mark W. Rutland, Mara Applebaum, Andrew J. Greaves, Gustavo S. Luengo, 2021 (sagepub.com)

2022 Tactile friction of topical creams and emulsions: Friction measurements on excised skin and VitroSkin® using ForceBoard™, Elsevier International Journal of Pharmaceutics

2022 Relationship between sensorial and physical characteristics of topical creams: A comparative study on effects of excipients, Elsevier International Journal of Pharmaceutics

 

Note: Industrial Dynamics Sweden AB has also developed an easy to use method that can be used to measure the exact contact area between your finger and a smooth hard surface.

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