Experimental Results of a 3-DOF Parallel Manipulator as an Earthquake Motion Simulator

Abstract

Parallel manipulators are increasingly used in new applications by exploiting their better characteristics with respect to those of serial manipulators, such as higher stiffness, velocity and acceleration, payload. In this paper, experimental results are presented of a novel application of a 3-DOF CaPaMan (Cassino Parallel Manipulator) prototype to simulate point seismograms and 3D earthquake motion. The rigid body acceleration (linear acceleration, angular velocity and acceleration) has been experimentally analyzed to simulate real 3D earthquakes by using the parallel manipulator. Furthermore, first experimental results are reported to analyze earthquake effects on scaled civil structures.

An Application of a 3-DOF Parallel Manipulator for Earthquake Simulations

“…The prototype of CaPaMan parallel manipulator has been successfully used to simulate earthquake motion characteristics, as reported in previous experiences [11] and [18]. In particular, point seismograms can be reproduced exactly but 3D seismic motion can be obtained only with similar characteristics of real events.…”

“…The effects of an earthquake on scaled civil structures have been studied and presented in [18]. For the above-mentioned analysis two more accelerometers have been installed on a scaled civil structure, as shown in the scheme of Fig.…”

An experimental characterization of earthquake effects on mechanism operation

“…In this paper the 3-D motion capability of CaPaMan parallel architecture has been used to simulate 3-D earthquake motion. In comparison with other common earthquake simulators, which only combine translational movements along vertical and horizontal directions, CaPaMan has the capability of simulating 3-D real seismic events, [2][3][4][5]. During simulation tests with CaPaMan, besides the translational movements along vertical and horizontal directions, will appear a rotational movement of the mobile platform which is important as regarding the simulation of a real seismic event.…”

“…In this paper a 3 DOF parallel manipulator is presented with experimental results regarding with earthquake motion, as an extension of previous work on this subject [2][3][4][5].…”

“…CaPaMan has been designed and built at the Laboratory of Robotics and Mechatronics (LARM), Cassino University, [2][3][4][5]10]. The laboratory test bed prototype consists of a parallel manipulator, an acquisition board connected to a computer and a controller.…”