filename     : Meg17b.pdf
entry        : article
conference   : ACM SIGGRAPH 2017, Los Angeles, United States, 30 July - 3 August, 2017
pages        : 82:1--82:12
year         : 2017
month        : August
title        : A Computational Design Tool for Compliant Mechanisms
subtitle     :
author       : Megaro, Vittorio and Zehnder, Jonas and B\"{a}cher, Moritz and Coros, Stelian and Gross, Markus and Thomaszewski, Bernhard
booktitle    : ACM Transactions on Graphics
ISSN/ISBN    : 
editor       : 
publisher    : ACM 
publ.place   : New York, NY, USA
volume       : 36
issue        : 4
language     : English
keywords     : 
abstract     : We present a computational tool for designing compliant mechanisms. Our method takes as input a conventional, rigidly-articulated mechanism defining the topology of the compliant design. This input can be both planar or spatial, and we support a number of common joint types which, whenever possible, are automatically replaced with parameterized flexures. As the technical core of our approach, we describe a number of objectives that shape the design space in a meaningful way, including trajectory matching, collision avoidance, lateral stability, resilience to failure, and minimizing motor torque. Optimal designs in this space are obtained as solutions to an equilibrium-constrained minimization problem that we solve using a variant of sensitivity analysis. We demonstrate our method on a set of examples that range from simple four-bar linkages to full-fledged animatronics, and verify the feasibility of our designs by manufacturing physical prototypes.