Mechanical design of a mini pointing device for a robotic assembly cell

The article describes the mechanical design and testing of a miniaturized spherical parallel manipulator, conceived to handle the orientation of a mobile platform during the assembly of very small components. The kinematic synthesis of the device has been driven by the cooperative tasks to be performed, aiming at enlarging the orientation workspace while still keeping good static performances and a high positioning accuracy. The preliminary experimental tests carried out on the first prototype of the manipulator are presented in the paper. The perspective is to contribute to the realization of general automatic production systems at the moment absent for objects of these dimensions.