Diseño y aplicación de un simulador interactivo de análisis y síntesis de mecanismos mediante aplicaciones de cálculo simbólico para CAD 3D

Abstract

We define the purpose of this work as an analysis of the available mathematical algorithms for solving Mechanisms Synthesis problems with the aim of generating an interactive simulation tool and with the intention of assisting mechanical designers, teachers and the students in the task of solving dimensional synthesis and exact rigid body guidance synthesis problems using symbolic computing tools and 3DCAD software. So we present the objectives of this thesis in several areas: (a) Industrial scope: Providing a useful tool for mechanical designers in order to solve synthesis of mechanisms; (b) Teaching scope: Giving a tool for being used in classroom with which teachers can give synthesis of mechanisms in a flexible and intuitive way, and with which students can self-learn this subject, (c) Institutional scope: Improving and promoting the transformation to the European Higher Education Space of engineering schools through the implementation of novel software tools.

So, after an intensive search through all Mechanical Engineering Degree compulsory subjects teaching guides, from all Spanish universities that offer this degree, we found that the synthesis of mechanisms is a subject that only appears in 20 of the 54 available subjects.

In order to improve this situation we suggest the following actions: -Implementing various support tools,-as we bring in this research-, in order to facilitate teaching of considerably dense subjects. -Creating specific optional subjects, postgraduates or master studies into which accommodate the knowledge area of mechanisms synthesis, thus providing enough time to teach and to learn subjects that otherwise would be very difficult to include in the syllabus of Mechanical Engineering Degree compulsory subjects. -Using interactive computer tools, with an easy and intuitive use, -as the one presented in our thesis-, that students can use in a quasi-autonomous way as a self-learning tool.

After analyzing the most representative tools that nowadays exist in the world of Mechanisms Synthesis, we detected some unmet needs. And for this reason we decided to make a computer application to fill these gaps.

The main advantages of our novel and novel software are: -It¿s fully editable by the user, so it can be modified, customized or extended without any limit. -It¿s integrated into the 3DCAD software CATIAv5. This fact allows mechanisms designers to work always in the same environment. -Avoids the introduction of numerical values. This fact makes our software very handy and flexible while avoids unwanted errors. -The result of its calculations is a wrl file, a format directly insertable into most of current 3DCAD platforms.