MODELING AND SIMULATION OF A DELTA ROBOT

We are Mechatronics Engineering students at Universidad Nacional de Colombia. In this project, we have designed a Delta Robot using the Rockwell Automation’s Motor MPL-A230P-HJ72AA and the CompactLogix control platform available in the Automation Laboratory at Universidad Nacional de Colombia. In order to develop it, there were limitations on the weight of the structure to obtain high-speed moves and strength and it was counterposed to the endurance of the different parts of the robot.  The configuration of the Delta robot makes difficult to calculate the strength in each arm that conform it and we were only capable to do some approximations taking points into the move trajectory. This is why we designed a CAD model and calculate the multiples stress on the body before the construction, but the main stresses are due to dynamical strengths. Using it, we confirmed whether the different parts of the robot were capable to handle the stresses through a finite element analysis. Afterward, we imposed motion profiles for each arm, and using the SolidWorks’ Motion Analysis tool we calculated the stress in the joints of the robot. These simulations were repeated changing materials and resizing some parts, looking for the most suitable combination for our application. At the end, we defined some materials which weren´t available before in the SolidWorks’ databases: Nylon and duralumin, and we generated the construction plans for the robot.