Manual release assembly for robotic surgical tool

A method of operating a surgical tool, comprising:

• positioning the surgical tool adjacent a patient for operation, the surgical tool including:
• a drive housing that houses a plurality of drive cable capstans;
• an elongate shaft that extends from the drive housing;
• an end effector operatively coupled to a distal end of the elongate shaft and including opposing first and second jaws;
• a plurality of drive cables extending from the drive housing to the end effector, wherein each drive cable is associated with a corresponding one of the plurality of drive cable capstans;
• and
• a manual release assembly coupled to the drive housing and including a release switch that is manually movable between a disengaged position and an engaged position;
• rotating one or more of the plurality of drive cable capstans and thereby correspondingly moving one or more of the plurality of drive cables to move the first and second jaws between open and closed positions;
• and
• manually moving the release switch to the engaged position and thereby rotating the plurality of drive cable capstans to move the plurality of drive cables and thereby manually move the first and second jaws to the open position.