Abstract
This thesis aims at development of a design methodology for the workspace of Hexaslide (parallel manipulators) with 3-DOF or 5-DOF, and the associated tools and concepts. To this end, we shall follow the following procedure in development. (1) First, under the assumption that the orientation of the platform is fixed, investigate the key design parameters and the effect of the orientation on the 3-D position workspace by a series of parametric studies. (2) Neglect and effect of secondary design parameters and based on the aforementioned results, properly simplify the 3-D workspace into regular geometric shapes. (3) Second, investigate the key design parameters and the effect on the 5-D workspace by a series parametric studies. (4) Neglect and effect of secondary design parameters and based on the aforementioned results, properly simplify the 5-D workspace into regular geometric shapes. (5) Conclude results obtained in steps (1) to (4) to propose a systematic procedure for the design of the workspace of Hexaslide, and determine the optimal architectures with the greatest 3-D or 5-D workspace.