Design of an active reconfigurable 2R joint

Abstract

The increasing flexibility requirements in the manufacturing processes has led to the development of novel reconfigurable mechanisms to be implemented in ma-chine heads and tables. This is the case of the reconfigurable parallel manipulators which are also used in a wide variety of applications. These mechanisms include often in their kinematic chains active or reconfigurable joints. In this paper, a 2R active reconfigurable joint is presented. As well as carrying out the kinematic characterization of the joint, a demonstrative prototype has been also built.