An algorithm for the automatic generation of kinematic chains.

Abstract

The computer algorithm for generating all the possible structural patterns of mechanisms with a given number of degrees of freedom, number of general constraints and number of loops has developed. First, loop patterns composed of links with three or more kinematic pairs, which represent shapes of loops, are determined, and the kinematic graphs are obtained by allocating binary links to some edges of each loop pattern. The number of cases to be considered when allocating binary links to the edges decreases by grouping the edges of loop patterns with the same characteristics and, consequently, the computational time is well reduced.