CRAFT: Long-Horizon Cable Routing Algorithm and Low-Friction Caging Gripper

Cable routing is a common manipulation task in assembly and manufacturing, yet it remains challenging due to the deformable nature of cables and the constraints of cluttered routing environments. In this paper, we present CRAFT: Cable Routing Around Fixtures using Two grippers, a novel hardware plus software architecture that integrates unimanual and bimanual operations for long-horizon cable routing. To address jamming due to friction, we present a novel caging gripper with roller mechanism. Physical experiments consisting of 160 trials on a modified NIST board with five types of fixtures and turning angle up to 900 degrees, yield an average completion ratio of 84.5% across four routing difficulty tiers, representing a 54.2% improvement over an earlier baseline. The cable routing materials and benchmarks are available at https://manipulation-net.org/tasks/cable_routing.html.