Duration: 24 months
Compliant mechanisms have always been interesting for scientific instrumentation. Indeed, they provide better precision and repeatability that any traditional solution. Recently, Additive Manufacturing (AM) brought new design paradigm. Hence, complex trajectories can now be achieved with compact and lightweight designs. As such, AM compliant mechanisms are more attractive than ever for space instrumentation. However, their design is an iterative process based on engineer experience and for which AM constraints are not yet mastered. This thesis aims to formalize and automatize the design for AM (DfAM) of space-borne compliant guiding mechanisms. This challenge will be addressed combining CSEM’s heritage in the design of space-borne compliant mechanisms with the expertise of the Product Development Group Zurich (ETHZ) in DfAM. Furthermore, AM constraints shall be considered early-on in the design process. Manufacturing compliant mechanisms is very specific. Thus, AM-feasible shall be redefined in that context. We plan to conduct experimental studies to understand how design impacts manufacturing. As the result of this research, we expect to automatize the processing of requirements into AM feasible compliant mechanisms. One can expect that such a tool will allow novice engineers to generate innovative designs.
