Dynamic Analysis of Partially Compliant Planar Slider-Crank Mechanism with Joint Clearance

In practical operation of mechanisms, joint clearances and compliance influence the overall performance drastically. Excessive clearances induce extra degrees of freedom at the joint, while compliance provides an additional torque. This paper presents the dynamic analysis of partially compliant planar slider-crank mechanism with joint clearance. When joint clearance is considered, an additional intermittent impact force acts on the system and velocity and acceleration as well as forces at the joints change drastically. Therefore, mechanisms are often made compliant with limited number of joints. In order to model compliant linkage, equivalent torque is introduced at the joint using pseudo-rigid-body modeling. Initially, the turning moment and force equations of crank, coupler, and slider are obtained in terms of contact forces at the clearance joint. Effect of clearance at the crank pin on the kinematic and dynamic characteristics is studied in detail.