What is Stewart Platform?
Stewart platform is a parallel handling device that is used to locate and control movement. The device consists of two boards connected by six adjustable legs that allow it to be precisely modified and controlled. Although originally used for tire testing, the Stewart platform soon found applications in the air, automotive and machining industries. It is perhaps best known for its use in providing accurate movement required for flight simulators.
Stewart motherboard is the only part of the device that is not adjustable. It is usually screwed to the floor or some other stable surface. Six legs attach the motherboard to the adjustable top plate. Both ends of the legs are connected using universal joints that allow a wide range of movement. Each of the legs has a cylinder joint, so the leg can be out of the telescope or collapsed as needed.
Due to the design of six legs, the Stewart platform is sometimes called hexapod. The term can be used to depress anya six -legged device. The Stewart platform is also classified as a parallel manipulator, which means that the legs of the platform are attached only to the base and top plate, but not to each other. In contrast, the serial manipulator uses a number of rigid structures connected by joints. One of these strict sections directly affects the location of sections after it.
Parallel manipulators show several advantages over serial manipulators. For example, a parallel manipulator can be controlled more precisely because errors are contained on one leg. In the serial manipulator, each of the structures that follow is amplified error in the movement of one of the stiff structures. Parallel manipulators are also able to handle much larger and heavier workloads and have a better strength ratio to mass than serial manipulators.
devices have become a Stewart platform, which was first designed by V. Eric Gough in the UK inin 1954. Gough worked as an engineer in the Dunlop tires in England, Birmingham when he built a early version of the Stewart platform, which was used in tire testing. Just more than ten years later, D. Stewart introduced a document by the British institution of mechanical engineers designing an adjustable platform to be used in flight simulators. Thus the device has acquired its name, although some engineers call it Gough-Stewart's platform in respect for the original inventor.