scholarly journals A Double-Layered Elbow Exoskeleton Interface With 3-PRR Planar Parallel Mechanism for Axis Self-Alignment

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammad I. Awad ◽  
Irfan Hussain ◽  
Shramana Ghosh ◽  
Yahya Zweiri ◽  
Dongming Gan

Abstract Designing a mechanism for elbow self-axis alignment requires the elimination of undesirable joint motion and tissue elasticity. The novelty of this work lies in proposing a double-layered interface using a 3-PRR planar parallel mechanism as a solution to the axis alignment problem. 3-PRR planar parallel mechanisms are suitable candidates to solve this as they can span the desired workspace in a relatively compact size. In this paper, we present the modeling, design, prototyping, and validation of the double-layered elbow exoskeleton interface for axis self-alignment. The desired workspace for the self-axis alignment mechanism is specified based on the estimated maximum possible misalignment between the exoskeleton joint and the human anatomical elbow joint. Kinematic parameters of the 3-PRR planar mechanism are identified by formulating an optimization problem. The goal is to find the smallest mechanism that can span the specified workspace. The orientation angle of the mechanism’s plane addresses the frontal frustum vertex angle of the elbow’s joint, while the translational motion allows the translational offsets between the user’s elbow and the exoskeleton joint. The designed exoskeleton axis can passively rotate around the frontal plane ±15 deg and translate along the workspace 30 mm in the frontal plane. Experimental results (quantitative and qualitative) confirmed the capability of the proposed exoskeleton in addressing the complex elbow motion, user’s satisfaction, and ergonomics.

Author(s):  
Xianwen Kong ◽  
Cle´ment M. Gosselin ◽  
Pierre-Luc Richard

There are usually several motion patterns having the same DOF (degree of freedom). For example, planar motion, spherical motion, and spatial translation are motion patterns with 3-DOF. An f-DOF parallel mechanism with multiple operation modes is a parallel mechanism that can generate different motion patterns with f DOF. Up to now, no method has been proposed for the type synthesis of parallel mechanisms with multiple operation modes. This paper presents a general method for the type synthesis of parallel mechanisms with multiple operation modes. Using the proposed approach, 3-DOF parallel mechanisms with both spherical and translational modes, i.e., parallel mechanisms generating both the spherical motion pattern and the spatial translational motion pattern, are generated systematically. A large number of parallel mechanisms with both spherical and translational modes are obtained.


2002 ◽  
Vol 124 (2) ◽  
pp. 259-264 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raffaele Di Gregorio ◽  
Vincenzo Parenti-Castelli

The occurrence of singular configurations in parallel mechanisms must be avoided during motion since the actuators cannot control motion even in the neighborhood of these configurations. As a consequence, the knowledge of the singular configurations of the mechanism is important for control purposes, for singularity-free path planning, and also represents basic information for the synthesis of a desired mechanism workspace free from singularities. In this paper the mobility analysis of the 3-UPU parallel mechanism assembled for obtaining a pure translation motion of the output platform is performed and both translation and rotation singularity loci are presented in analytic form and their geometric interpretation is given.


2006 ◽  
Vol 129 (6) ◽  
pp. 595-601 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xianwen Kong ◽  
Clément M. Gosselin ◽  
Pierre-Luc Richard

There are usually several motion patterns having the same degrees of freedom (DOF). For example, planar motion, spherical motion, and spatial translation are motion patterns with 3 DOF. An f-DOF parallel mechanism with multiple operation modes is a parallel mechanism that can generate different motion patterns with f DOF. Up to now, no method has been proposed for the type synthesis of parallel mechanisms with multiple operation modes. This paper presents a general method for the type synthesis of parallel mechanisms with multiple operation modes. Using the proposed approach, 3-DOF parallel mechanisms with both spherical and translational modes, i.e., parallel mechanism generating both a spherical motion pattern and a spatial translational motion pattern, are generated systematically. A large number of parallel mechanisms with both spherical and translational modes are obtained.


2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Haitao Liu ◽  
Ke Xu ◽  
Huiping Shen ◽  
Xianlei Shan ◽  
Tingli Yang

Abstract Direct kinematics with analytic solutions is critical to the real-time control of parallel mechanisms. Therefore, the type synthesis of a mechanism having explicit form of forward kinematics has become a topic of interest. Based on this purpose, this paper deals with the type synthesis of 1T2R parallel mechanisms by investigating the topological structure coupling-reducing of the 3UPS&UP parallel mechanism. With the aid of the theory of mechanism topology, the analysis of the topological characteristics of the 3UPS&UP parallel mechanism is presented, which shows that there are highly coupled motions and constraints amongst the limbs of the mechanism. Three methods for structure coupling-reducing of the 3UPS&UP parallel mechanism are proposed, resulting in eight new types of 1T2R parallel mechanisms with one or zero coupling degree. One obtained parallel mechanism is taken as an example to demonstrate that a mechanism with zero coupling degree has an explicit form for forward kinematics. The process of type synthesis is in the order of permutation and combination; therefore, there are no omissions. This method is also applicable to other configurations, and novel topological structures having simple forward kinematics can be obtained from an original mechanism via this method.


2020 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fu-Qun Zhao ◽  
Sheng Guo ◽  
Hai-Jun Su ◽  
Hai-Bo Qu ◽  
Ya-Qiong Chen

Abstract As the structures of multiarm robots are serially arranged, the packaging and transportation of these robots are often inconvenient. The ability of these robots to operate objects must also be improved. Addressing this issue, this paper presents a type of multiarm robot that can be adequately folded into a designed area. The robot can achieve different operation modes by combining different arms and objects. First, deployable kinematic chains (DKCs) are designed, which can be folded into a designated area and be used as an arm structure in the multiarm robot mechanism. The strategy of a platform for storing DKCs is proposed. Based on the restrictions in the storage area and the characteristics of parallel mechanisms, a class of DKCs, called base assembly library, is obtained. Subsequently, an assembly method for the synthesis of the multiarm robot mechanism is proposed, which can be formed by the connection of a multiarm robot mechanism with an operation object based on a parallel mechanism structure. The formed parallel mechanism can achieve a reconfigurable characteristic when different DKCs connect to the operation object. Using this method, two types of multiarm robot mechanisms with four DKCs that can switch operation modes to perform different tasks through autonomous combination and release operation is proposed. The obtained mechanisms have observable advantages when compared with the traditional mechanisms, including optimizing the occupied volume during transportation and using parallel mechanism theory to analyze the switching of operation modes.


Author(s):  
Duanling Li ◽  
Pu Jia ◽  
Jiazhou Li ◽  
Dan Zhang ◽  
Xianwen Kong

Abstract The current research of reconfigurable parallel mechanism mainly focuses on the construction of reconfigurable joints. Compared with the method of changing the mobility by physical locking joints, the geometric constraint has good controllability, and the constructed parallel mechanism has more configurations and wider application range. This paper presents a reconfigurable axis (rA) joint inspired and evolved from Rubik's Cubes, which have a unique feature of geometric and physical constraint of axes of joint. The effectiveness of the rA joint in the construction of the limb is analyzed, resulting in a change in mobility and topology of the parallel mechanism. The rA joint makes the angle among the three axes inside the groove changed arbitrarily. This change in mobility is completed by the case illustrated by a 3(rA)P(rA) reconfigurable parallel mechanism having variable mobility from 1 to 6 and having various special configurations including pure translations, pure rotations. The underlying principle of the metamorphosis of this rA joint is shown by investigating the dependence of the corresponding screw system comprising of line vectors, leading to evolution of the rA joint from two types of spherical joints to three types of variable Hooke joints and one revolute joint. The reconfigurable parallel mechanism alters its topology by rotating or locking the axis of rA joint to turn all limbs into different phases. The prototype of reconfigurable parallel mechanism is manufactured and all configurations are enumerated to verify the validity of the theoretical method by physical experiments.


2021 ◽  
pp. 109963622110204
Author(s):  
Mehdi Zarei ◽  
Gholamhossien Rahimi ◽  
Davoud Shahgholian-Ghahfarokhi

The free vibration behavior of sandwich conical shells with reinforced cores is investigated in the present study using experimental, analytical, and numerical methods. A new effective smeared method is employed to superimpose the stiffness contribution of skins with those of the stiffener in order to achieve equivalent stiffness of the whole structure. The stiffeners are also considered as a beam to support shear forces and bending moments in addition to the axial forces. Using Donnell’s shell theory and Galerkin method, the natural frequencies of the sandwich shell are subsequently derived. To validate analytical results, experimental modal analysis (EMA) is further conducted on the conical sandwich shell. For this purpose, a method is designed for manufacturing specimens through the filament winding process. For more validation, a finite element model (FEM) is built. The results revealed that all the validations were in good agreement with each other. Based on these analyses, the influence of the cross-sectional area of the stiffeners, the semi-vertex angle of the cone, stiffener orientation angle, and the number of stiffeners are investigated as well. The results achieved are novel and can be thus employed as a benchmark for further studies.


2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 172988142110177
Author(s):  
Jia Yonghao ◽  
Chen Xiulong

For spatial multibody systems, the dynamic equations of multibody systems with compound clearance joints have a high level of nonlinearity. The coupling between different types of clearance joints may lead to abundant dynamic behavior. At present, the dynamic response analysis of the spatial parallel mechanism considering the three-dimensional (3D) compound clearance joint has not been reported. This work proposes a modeling method to investigate the influence of the 3D compound clearance joint on the dynamics characteristics of the spatial parallel mechanism. For this purpose, 3D kinematic models of spherical clearance joint and revolute joint with radial and axial clearances are derived. Contact force is described as normal contact and tangential friction and later introduced into the nonlinear dynamics model, which is established by the Lagrange multiplier technique and Jacobian of constraint matrix. The influences of compound clearance joint and initial misalignment of bearing axes on the system are analyzed. Furthermore, validation of dynamics model is evaluated by ADAMS and Newton–Euler method. This work provides an essential theoretical basis for studying the influences of 3D clearance joints on dynamic responses and nonlinear behavior of parallel mechanisms.


Author(s):  
Yu Zou ◽  
Yuru Zhang

The maximum wrench capabilities of the cable-driven parallel mechanisms are investigated in this paper. Focusing on accuracy and efficiency, two methods, an optimization-based method and a hybrid method based on optimization and geometry, are presented for determining the wrench capability of the cable-driven parallel mechanisms. Both methods are applied to a 6-DOF cable-driven parallel mechanism with eight cables to compute the maximum isotropic force and maximum isotropic moment. Comparison of the two methods is made. The results show that the hybrid method proposed is more accurate and computationally efficient.


2010 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 355-363 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hiroshi Yachi ◽  
◽  
Hiroshi Tachiya

This paper proposes a calibration method for parallel mechanisms usingResponse Surface Methodology. This method is a statistical approach to estimating an unknown input-output relationship using a small set of efficient data collected on an intended system. Although identifying locations causing positional errors in a parallel mechanism and precisely measuring the position and posture of the output point are difficult, the proposed calibration method based onResponse Surface Methodologyaims to compensate for positional and postural errors, without indentifying the locations causing these errors, by using a small yet efficient measurement data set. This study analyzes the effectiveness of the method we propose by applying it to a Stewart platform, which is a typical spatial 6-DOF parallel mechanism.


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