Insect Wing Buckling Influences Stress and Stability During Collisions

Flapping insect wings frequently collide with vegetation and other obstacles during flight. Repeated collisions may irreversibly damage the insect wing, thereby compromising the insect’s ability to fly. Further, reaction torques caused by the collision may destabilize the insect and hinder its ability to maneuver. To mitigate the adverse effects of impact, some insect wings are equipped with a flexible joint called a “costal break.” The costal break buckles once it exceeds a critical angle, which is believed to improve flight stability and prevent irreversible wing damage. However, to our knowledge, there are no models to predict the dynamics of the costal break. Through this research, we develop a simple model of an insect wing with a costal break. The wing was modeled as two beams interconnected by a torsional spring, where the stiffness of the torsional spring instantaneously decreases once it has exceeded a critical angle. We conducted a series of static tests to approximate model parameters. Then, we used numerical simulation to estimate the peak stresses and reaction moments experienced by the wing during a collision. We found that costal break increased the wing’s natural frequency by about 50% compared to a homogeneous wing and thus reduced the stress associated with normal flapping. Buckling did not significantly affect peak stresses during collision. Joint buckling reduced the peak reaction moment by about 32%, suggesting that the costal break enhances flight stability.

A mechanochromic donor-acceptor torsional spring

Mechanochromic polymers are intriguing materials that allow to sense force of specimens under load. Most mechanochromic systems rely on covalent bond scission and hence are two-state systems with optically distinct “on” and “off” states where correlating force with wavelength is usually not possible. Translating force of different magnitude with gradually different wavelength of absorption or emission would open up new possibilities to map and understand force distributions in polymeric materials. Here, we present a mechanochromic donor-acceptor (DA) torsional spring that undergoes force-induced planarization during uniaxial elongation leading to red-shifted absorption and emission spectra. The DA spring is based on ortho-substituted diketopyrrolopyrrole (o-DPP). Covalent incorporation of o-DPP into a rigid yet ductile polyphenylene matrix allows to transduce sufficiently large stress to the DA spring. The mechanically induced deflection from equilibrium geometry of the DA spring is theoretically predicted, in agreement with experiments, and is fully reversible upon stress release.

Design optimization analysis of an anti-backlash geared servo system using a mechanical resonance simulation and experiment

In many mechatronic systems, gear transmission chains are often used to transmit motion and power between motors and loads, especially for light, small but large torque output systems. Gear transmission chains will inevitably bring backlash as well as elasticity of shafts and meshing teeth. All of these nonlinear factors will affect the performance of mechatronic systems. Anti-backlash gear systems can reduce the transmission error, but elasticity has to be considered too. The aim of this paper is to find the key parameters affecting the resonance and anti-resonance frequencies of anti-backlash gear systems and then to give the design optimization methods of improving performance, both from element parameters and mechanical designing. The anti-backlash geared servo system is modeled using a two-inertia approximate model; a method of computing the equivalent stiffness of anti-backlash gear train is proposed, which comprehensively considers the total backlash of transmission chain, gear mesh stiffness, gear shaft stiffness and torsional spring stiffness. With the s-domain block diagram model of the anti-backlash geared servo system, the influences of four main factors on the resonance and anti-resonance frequencies of system are analyzed by simulation according to the frequency response, and the simulation analysis results dependent on torsional spring stiffness of anti-backlash gear pair and load moment of inertia variation are verified by the experiment. The errors between simulation and experimental results are less than 10 Hz. With these simulation and experiment results, the design optimization methods of improving the resonance and anti-resonance frequencies such as designing the center distance adjusting mechanism to reduce the initial total backlash, increasing the stiffness of torsional spring and lightweight design of load are proposed in engineering applications.

Bistability in Cylindrical Developable Mechanisms Through the Principle of Reflection

We present a resource for designing bistable developable mechanisms (BDMs) that reach their second stable positions while exterior or interior to a cylindrical surface. Analysis of the necessary conditions to create extramobile and intramobile cylindrical BDMs is conducted through a series of three tests. These tests contain elements of both existing and new mechanism design tools, including a novel graphical method for identifying stable positions of linkages using a single dominant torsional spring, called the principle of reflection. These tests are applied to all possible mechanism cases and configurations to identify why certain configurations will always, sometimes, or never be a BDM. Two tables summarize these results as a guide when designing extramobile and intramobile BDMs. The results are compared and demonstrated with a numerical simulation of 30,000+ mechanisms, including several example mechanisms that illustrate the concepts discussed in the work. Discussion is then provided on the implication of these results.

Biomimetic Design of a Planar Torsional Spring to an Active Knee Prosthesis Actuator Using FEM Analysis

Lower-limb prostheses have an important function to partially recover the leg movement after amputation. In order to improve the mechanical joint behavior towards a healthy human knee, compliant elements have been introduced to the active prostheses, comprised of the well-known Series Elastic Actuators (SEAs). SEAs are used in lower-limb assistive devices due to their ability to tolerate impacts and passive store mechanical energy during ground-walking. Based on the healthy human knee in the stance phase of walking, this paper brings the design, prototyping, and analysis of a customized planar torsional spring. To enhance the compliance of a rigid active knee prosthesis, the proposed spring will substitute a torque flange between the transmission and the output of the actuator, and this carries a series of constraints to the design. The finite element method (FEM) is applied to the development and exploration of the three initially proposed geometries and the material selection along with its heat treatment is based on the maximum stress obtained in the simulations. The proposed geometry, chosen by comparison of the three, is made of austempered AISI 4340 steel and using two springs in parallel and it has a torsional stiffness of 250 N.m/rad with maximum angular displacement of ± 2.5° and 0.153 kg. In future work, we intend to compare the results of the rigid actuator against the SEA one during walking over the ground.