Design of a Lightweight Deployable Planar Parallel Manipulator with Tape Spring Mechanism

EasyChair Preprint 2344, version 2

Abstract

A tape spring is a thin-walled, open cylindrical structure with a natural transverse curvature. The localized folds in the tape spring can be served as revolute joints, and the unfolded straight segments served as links. If an external torque is imposed on the fold, the fold can slide along the tape spring. Inspired by that, a novel deployable planar parallel manipulator composed of one tape spring and two driving pulleys is proposed for the first time. The kinematics and dynamics models are derived. Within consideration of buckling stability of the tape spring, the workspace of the moving platform is investigated. At last, the prototype is manufactured and experimented to validate the presented design and analysis. With the virtue of low masses, simple mechanics and high efficiency of enfoldment, potential application of the deployable parallel manipulator for unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is discussed.

Keyphrases: Deployable parallel manipulator, Tape spring, Workspace, dynamics, kinematics

@booklet{EasyChair:2344,
  author    = {Yaqi Tang and Huayong Zheng and Lei Tang and Yan Peng and Huayan Pu and Yi Yang},
  title     = {Design of a Lightweight Deployable Planar Parallel Manipulator with Tape Spring Mechanism},
  howpublished = {EasyChair Preprint 2344},
  year      = {EasyChair, 2020}}