CONSTRAINT-BASED ANALYSIS OF PARALLEL KINEMATIC ARTICULATED WRIST MECHANISM
Abstract This paper presents a systematic constraint-based analysis of the performance attributes of eight parallel kinematic articulated wrist mechanisms from the existing literature. These performance attributes include the number, nature (i.e. pure rotation, or translation, or a combination), and location of a mechanism's Degrees of Freedom (DoFs) in the nominal and displaced configurations, load transmission capability along these DoFs, and load bearing capability along the constraint directions. This systematic analysis reveals performance tradeoffs between these performance attributes for a given mechanism, as well as design tradeoffs across these mechanisms. This analysis also helps inform the suitability of a given mechanism for specific applications.