Multibody system dynamics and mechatronics

Abstract

Mechatronics as an interdisciplinary combination of domains of mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, electronics, and computer science has developed in industry and universities since the eighties of the last century, and it is meanwhile fully established in many technical areas. The main focus of the mechatronic approach is to extend and to complete the design process of mechanical and more general engineering systems by incorporating from the very beginning sensors and controllers – which includes also the required information processing – and thus being able to generate partly intelligent products. The components and modules of such systems originate from mechanical engineering, from electrical engineering or from other engineering domains. Methods for describing and designing these components and modules are based in the fields of applied mechanics, electrical engineering, system theory, control and automation theory, and information processing. In particular, in mechatronic systems like robots, manipulation systems, machine tools, or all kinds of vehicles, the multibody systems approach offers a powerful tool to model the mechanical properties of the system in an appropriate manner. In this paper, methodologies for the development of formalisms and software for modeling and simulation of multibody and mechatronic systems will be presented and illustrated by examples from automotive systems and robotics.