On the Configurational Isomorphism of a Reconfigurable Cube Mechanism
Reconfigurable cube mechanism (RCM) is a brainstorming puzzle made by eight connected cubes.It is equivalent to a single-loop 8R spatial linkage possessing eight different topological configurations during reconfiguration.Interestingly,the reconfiguration of the RCM has spotted a new research topic in mechanism and machine science on the configurational isomorphism identification of mechanisms.An RCM is called configurationally isomorphic to another one if they share the same relative joint orientations,namely orientation isomorphism, and the same relative joint distances,namely distance isomorphism. It is found that two RCMs could be hugely different in appearance at certain configurations which are actually configurationally isomorphic.For dealing with such problem,this paper proposes a method for identifying the configurational isomorphism of RCMs.The identification procedure is performed by programmable matrix operations via vector and screw algebras.Two examples are provided for illustrating the approach.The first one shows that two RCMs may look different but actually identical in their topological configurations.The later one demonstrates that two seemingly identical RCMs may be orientation isomorphic but distance non-isomorphic.
Reconfigurable mechanism Variable topology mechanism Structural isomorphism Configurational isomorphism
Chin-Hsing Kuo Jyun-Wei Su
Department of Mechanical Engineering,National Taiwan University of Science and Technology,Taipei 106,Taiwan
国际会议
天津
英文
1-8
2014-07-06（万方平台首次上网日期，不代表论文的发表时间）