A CAE-based Tool for Energy-Optimal Trajectory Planning in Automatic Machines

Position-controlled Servo-Mechanisms, commonly referred to as electronic cams, are widely employed in automatic machines in order to increase flexibility and versatility. Nonetheless, at the state-of-the-art, these mechatronic devices are still sub-optimized when energy consumption is considered as a performance metric. In fact, the industrial scenario is missing not only energy-efficient hardware (available though cost ineffective), but also virtual prototyping platforms allowing to effectively compute energy-optimized motions. In this context, the purpose of the present abstract, is to introduce a CAEbased tool, conceived with non-experts in mind, that allows to determine energy-optimal point-to-point trajectories, starting from a virtual model of the servo-system, built in a ComputerAided-Engineering environment. Index Terms—Servo-Mechanisms, Virtual Prototyping, Trajectory comparison, Eco-Design Methods, CAD/CAE tools.