DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT OF A SIMULATOR FOR FLEXIBLE LINK MECHANISMS

In this work an efficient method in dynamic modelling of spatial flexible-link robots under large displacements and small deformations is investigated and a typical MatlabTM software simulator based on it is presented and validated. The method presented here is based on an Equivalent Rigid Link System (ERLS) that provides to decouple the kinematic equations of the ERLS from the equations of the displacements at the joints giving an easy and recursive procedure. The simulator presented in this paper is appropriate for modelling and dynamic simulating of typical 3D serial flexible-link robots. Then the MatlabTM software simulator is validated according to the Adams-FlexTM commercial software, which performs Floating Frame of Reference (FFR) formulation, which is one of the common methods in dynamic modelling of multibody flexible-link mechanisms with large displacements and small deformations. Also, Experimental tests are implemented with a benchmark L-shape mechanism.