This technical brief presents the operational envelope for the spatial Stewart platform and dome of a six degree of freedom driving simulator, extending prior work that has been limited to planar mechanisms and manipulators. The set of all points in space that can be occupied by any point in the dome of the simulator is defined as its operational envelope. The geometry of the driving simulator’s dome and unilateral constraints on actuator lengths are incorporated and details of the defining equations for the operational envelope are given. Numerical methods are used to calculate the boundary of the operational envelope and results are presented in graphical form.

Issue Section:
Technical Briefs
Topics:
Actuators, Degrees of freedom, Domes (Structural elements), Geometry, Manipulators, Numerical analysis
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