THE INFLUENCE OF KINEMATIC REDUNDANCIES IN THE ENERGY EFFICIENCY OF PLANAR PARALLEL MANIPULATORS

Parallel manipulators present advantages compared to serial ones, such as higher load-carrying capacity, improved accuracy and increased stiffness. However, parallel manipulators possess limitations due to the presence of singularities. It has been proved that kinematic and actuation redundancy promote a significant reduction in the singularities and homogenization on the actuation forces. This paper evaluates the effect of the addition of kinematic redundancy in the energy efficiency of parallel manipulators. In order to do so, the required mechanical energy consumed by a 3RRR non-redundant planar parallel manipulator and their kinematically redundant versions, to perform several predefined trajectories is minimized using a genetic algorithm. The result of the comparison shows that the required mechanical energy to perform a given trajectory can be reduced with the addition of kinematic redundancy.