A Six Degree ofFreedom Epicyclic-Parallel Manipulator

Abstract

Abstract A new six-dof epicyclic-parallel manipulator with all actuators allocated on the ground is introduced. It is shown that the system has a considerably simple kinematics relationship, with the complete direct and inverse kinematics analysis provided. Further, the first and second links of each leg can be driven independently by two motors. The serial and parallel singularities of the system are determined, with an interesting feature of the system being that the parallel singularity is independent of the position of the end-effector. The workspace of the manipulator is also analyzed with future applications in haptics in mind.