Modeling and analysis of rigid multibody systems with driving constraints and frictional translation joints

An approach is proposed for modeling and analyses of rigid multibody systems with frictional translation joints and driving constraints. The geometric constraints of translational joints with small clearance are treated as bilateral constraints by neglecting the impact between sliders and guides. Firstly, the normal forces acting on sliders, the driving constraint forces (or moments) and the constraint forces of smooth revolute joints are all described by complementary conditions. The frictional contacts are characterized by a setvalued force law of Coulomb’s dry friction. Combined with the theory of the horizontal linear complementarity problem (HLCP), an event-driven scheme is used to detect the transitions of the contact situation between sliders and guides, and the stick-slip transitions of sliders, respectively. And then, all constraint forces in the system can be computed easily. Secondly, the dynamic equations of multibody systems are written at the acceleration-force level by the Lagrange multiplier technique, and the Baumgarte stabilization method is used to reduce the constraint drift. Finally, a numerical example is given to show some non-smooth dynamical behaviors of the studied system. The obtained results validate the feasibility of algorithm and the effect of constraint stabilization.