Kinematic calibration of a Gough-Stewart based high-precision pointing mechanism

A novel high-precision pointing mechanism based on the Gough-Stewart platform is presented which can be applied in the space position field. The complete identification method including error modeling, identification of kinematics parameters and simulation verification is carried out. Firstly, the mechanical structure of the proposed mechanism which adopts the offset joints other than universal joints is introduced briefly. Second, the inverse kinematics, forward kinematics and error model are then derived in detail. The calibration algorithm and the calibration of workspace are then presented. Finally, the identification method of kinematics parameters is addressed, and the simulation verification is utilized to verify the effective of the proposed kinematic calibration. The results show that the proposed method can improve the accuracy of the presented mechanism effectively.