Loop Based Detection of Isomorphism Among Chains, Inversions and Type of Freedom in Multi Degree of Freedom Chain

Structural synthesis of kinematic chains usually involves the creation of a complete list of kinematic chains, followed by a isomorphism test to discard duplicate chains. A significant unsolved problem in structural synthesis is the guaranteed precise elimination of all isomorphs. Many methods are available to the kinematician to detect isomorphism among chains and inversions but each has its own shortcomings. Most of the study to detect isomorphism is based on link-adjacency matrices or their modification but the study based on loops is very scanty although it is very important part of a kinematic chain.  Using the loop concept a method is reported in this paper to reveal simultaneously chain is isomorphic, link is isomorphic, and type of freedom with no extra computational effort. A new invariant for a chain, called the chain loop string is developed for a planar kinematic chain with simple joints to detect isomorphism among chains. Another invariant called the link adjacency string is developed, which is a by-product of the same method to detect inversions of a given chain. The proposed method is also applicable to know the type of freedom of a chain in case of multi degree of freedom chains. [S1050-0472(00)70801-4]