Title: Design and virtual implementation of a parallel robot in a medium boat for stabilisation purpose

Authors: Valiollah Nekoonam; Mehdi Soleymani

Addresses: Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Arak University, Arak 38156-8-8349, Iran ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Arak University, Arak 38156-8-8349, Iran

Abstract: A vessel in sea is subjected to wind and sea wave excitations which may cause unpleasant transmitted motions. Gyro active stabilisers normally employed to stabilise objects mounted on the vessel deck cannot attenuate transmitted translational motions. Utilising concept of parallel robot for stabilisation purpose in vessels, design and implementation of a stable platform in a medium boat is addressed in this paper. For this purpose, a novel fuzzy-PSO controller is proposed. Furthermore, the controller is implemented in a virtual prototype model developed for the vessel and the mounted stabiliser. Performance of the controller is examined in the presence of measured sea wave excitations. Simulation results reveal the effectiveness of the proposed parallel robot in decreasing the transmitted heave, roll, and pitch motions.

Keywords: parallel robots; vessel stabilisation; fuzzy control; particle swarm optimisation; PSO; virtual prototype; robot design; boat stability; stable platforms; controller design; sea waves; wave excitations; simulation; heave; roll; pitch; motion control.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMRS.2015.074106

International Journal of Mechanisms and Robotic Systems, 2015 Vol.2 No.3/4, pp.196 - 213

Received: 30 Jun 2014
Accepted: 09 Feb 2015
Published online: 11 Jan 2016 *

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