Transformation of static balancer from truss to linkage

This paper presents a transformation method by which a static balancer of a truss is transformed into static balancers of various mechanisms. For conventional design methods the kinematics and potential energy of every mechanism should be computed to design a static balancer. For the proposed design method, however, no computation of kinematics and potential energy is necessary to obtain static balancers of various mechanisms, once a static balancer of a truss has been designed. The concepts of the Baranov truss and associated linkage are adopted to determine transformation relations. Conversion rules are developed in the viewpoint of gravitational torques and deletion rules are determined to apply conversion rules to the design equation. Static balancers of various mechanisms (four-bar linkage, slider crank mechanism, Watt mechanism and sliding mechanism derived from the watt mechanism) are derived from those of the five-link and seven-link Baranov trusses in this paper. Simulations results showed that complete gravity compensation is achieved for all derived mechanisms from Baranov trusses.