A novel design of variable stiffness linkage with distributed leaf springs
Compliance is an important property in machine, but mechanism to realize compliance is not adequate to the demand. In this paper, the variable stiffness linkage (VSL) was designed to achieve safety assurance, stability improvement and energy conservation in robots and mechanical applications. Stiffness change could be realized by changing the position of the slider on each leaf spring. In order to save the energy from holding the specific stiffness, a screw-slider-linkage-slider mechanism was applied. Design principle and mechanical realization of VSL were presented. And then an effective stiffness model was designed. Finally the simulation was performed, which proved the effectiveness of VSL.