Systematic Design Method and Experimental Validation of a 2-DOF Compliant Parallel Mechanism with Excellent Input and Output Decoupling Performances

The output and input coupling characteristics of the compliant parallel mechanism (CPM) bring difficulty in the motion control and challenge its high performance and operational safety. This paper presents a systematic design method for a 2-degrees-of-freedom (DOFs) CPM with excellent decoupling performance. A symmetric kinematic structure can guarantee a CPM with a complete output decoupling characteristic; input coupling is reduced by resorting to a flexure-based decoupler. This work discusses the stiffness design requirement of the decoupler and proposes a compound flexure hinge as its basic structure. Analytical methods have been derived to assess the mechanical performances of the CPM in terms of input and output stiffness, motion stroke, input coupling degree, and natural frequency. The CPM’s geometric parameters were optimized to minimize the input coupling while ensuring key performance indicators at the same time. The optimized CPM’s performances were then evaluated by using a finite element analysis. Finally, a prototype was constructed and experimental validations were carried out to test the performance of the CPM and verify the effectiveness of the design method. The design procedure proposed in this paper is systematic and can be extended to design the CPMs with other types of motion.