Series Solution for Finite Displacement of Single-Loop Spatial Linkages

Abstract

The kinematic differential equation for a spatial point trajectory accepts the time-varying instantaneous screw of a rigid body as input, the time-zero coordinates of a point on that rigid body as the initial condition and generates the space curve traced by that point over time as the solution. Applying this equation to multiple points on a rigid body derives the kinematic differential equations for a displacement matrix and for a joint screw. The solution of these differential equations in turn expresses the trajectory over the course of a finite displacement taken by a coordinate frame in the case of the displacement matrix, by a joint axis line in the case of a screw. All of the kinematic differential equations are amenable to solution by power series owing to the expression for the product of two power series. The kinematic solution for finite displacement of a single-loop spatial linkage may, hence, be expressed either in terms of displacement matrices or in terms of screws. Each method determines coefficients for joint rates by a recursive procedure that solves a sequence of linear systems of equations, but that procedure requires only a single factorization of a 6 by 6 matrix for a given initial posture of the linkage. The inverse kinematics of an 8R nonseparable redundant-joint robot, represented by one of the multiple degrees of freedom of a 9R loop, provides a numerical example of the new analytical technique.