The Double-Koenigs Mechanism

摘要

A novel spatial mechanism able for reconfiguration with a cusp in its configuration space is presented for the first time. The building blocks of the mechanism are two Koenigs joints whose couplers are connected through another link. Using the geometric properties of the coupler curves of both Koenigs joints it is found that the configuration space of the mechanism exhibits a cusp and that other three regular branches are intersecting at this cusp. The kinematic tangent cone at the cusp is computed, and it is shown that such local analyis is insufficient to describe the local properties of the configuration space at the cusp, thus presenting a challenge for local analyses methods.