Universal mechanism modeling method in virtual assembly environment

Motion simulation and performance analysis of mechanism are important methods for analyzing assembly quality after finishing assembly simulation in virtual assembly environment. However, most simulation systems have no function of mechanism motion simulation due to the randomicity of mechanism and lack of universal mechanism modeling method. In order to realize the simulation of any mechanism after finishing assembly simulation in a virtual environment, a new universal mechanism modeling method is presented. Two main models are contained in the mechanism model: information model and mathematical model. Firstly, the information model of mechanism is proposed to describe the data structure of mechanism which contains bottom geometry data, information of constraint, link, kinematic pair and physical data. Because the object of mechanism simulation is the assembly, which is assembled during the process of assembly simulation, the information of mechanism can be obtained automatically through mechanism automatic search method. Secondly, mathematical model of mechanism is presented. The mathematical model uses mathematical method to express the mechanism. In order to realize the automatic expression of any random mechanism, basic constraint library is presented, consequently random mechanism can be described based on the basic constraint library. Finally, two examples are introduced to validate the method in the prototype system named VAPP(Virtual Assembly Process Planning). The validation result shows that the mechanism modeling provides a universal modeling method for mechanism motion simulation in virtual assembly environment. This research has important effect on the development both of mechanism motion simulation and virtual assembly.