Cam mechanisms are widely utilized for automatic devices in production lines, and the important influences for accuracy of out motions are the kinematic characteristics of follower motions. In order to realize and analyze the influence of the error in manufacturing processes, this research is going to analyze the planar cam-follower motion curve by using the reverse function in a measuring system. The goal of this research is to improve the measuring accuracy and efficiency in a cam measuring system. Results obtained by applying the developed measuring system also compared to those obtained by using a coordinate measuring machine.

The basic planar cam mechanisms and link mechanisms are widely used in industrial automatic machines. In determining the design method and design procedure for the cam-link mechanism, the basic kinematic synthesis and motion curve generation method require effective design procedure and optimization method to determine the kinematic structure of the mechanism and its kinematic performance clearly. In order to determine the result of the multi-objective optimization problem for the cam-link mechanism, the genetic algorithm is defined as the problem solver and begins this dissertation. By considering the influences of the parameters in the evolving procedure and by defining the conditions of the parameters and variables properly, the best solutions of the multi-objective optimization problem can then be solved successfully. By comparing the curves for the motion synthesis of the cam-link mechanism, the existing motion functions with their kinematic characteristics used in cam mechanisms are introduced and the rational B-spline motion function is proposed. By using the genetic algorithm to approximate the motion curves that is combined with trigonometric functions, the flexibility of the rational B-spline is demonstrated. Furthermore, to minimize different kinematic characteristics of the single-objective minimization problems, these problems are also searched by using rational B-splines with genetic algorithm for having better results. For synthesizing different structures of cam-link mechanisms, first of all is to derive the kinematics of the two planar link mechanisms and four planar cam mechanisms and then the genetic algorithm is used here to find out the minimal cam dimension with the limits of the motion curves, the pressure angles, and the radius of curvatures. Then, the kinematic synthesis problem of the function generation slider-crank mechanisms as the slider starts at the toggle position is discussed. Through the analysis finds out that when using the traditional motion functions with acceleration continuity to synthesize the slider motion, the angular acceleration of the crank cannot be continuous. To achieve the acceleration continuity of the crank motion, the curve that contains the fourth derivatives of the displacement with respect to time are set to be zeros can fulfill the continuity requirement. Then using the structural synthesis design procedure, by following the input and output relations of the link mechanisms and cam mechanisms with design constraints to select the proper structures of the mechanisms. To apply the cam-link mechanism in real application, a machine containing a slider-crank mechanism as toggle mechanism is introduced. Through the design constraints of space and motion limits to find out the possible mechanism structure and define the dimensions and then analyze the kinematics and kinetostatics of the machine. By using the genetic algorithm to solve the multi-objective optimization problem, the parameters of the rational B-spline are adjusted to have optimal kinematics and minimal kinetostatics to reduce the contact stress and to improve the fatigue life of the cam follower. Due to the existing problem of the slider-crank mechanism that contains discontinuous acceleration at the toggle position, to prove the correctness of the theoretical results, the experimental tests are measured and verified with the theoretical results in high similarity. The results show that when the slider motion curves begin at the toggle position with boundary motion constraints up to fourth or more than fourth derivatives of the displacement with respect to time that are set to be zeros, the angular accelerations of the cranks are continuous. In summary, this dissertation provides suggestions of the kinematic characteristics for the designer to design cam-link mechanisms that contain a slider-crank mechanism as the toggle mechanism and design methods for the synthesis, analysis and experimental test of the simple function generation cam-link mechanism.