Stewart Platform

[aeroshantanu]

Hello All,

I am working on 6 DOF Stewart Platform/Hexapod. We are using Smartmotors(Class 4) from Animatics. Those motors are pretty old though. I tried to program them using SMI (SmartMotor Interface) software. They are working nice. Now the task is to write a program in LabVIEW. I am beginner in the field of automation- programming and LabVIEW. I am going to connect it using USB chord(COM3 R232 Channel).

I am bit lost here.

If anyone knows how to do it or anyone have any .VI for the same then please do share with me. My target is to control all six actuators with labview in order to have different positions of the platform like YAW-PITCH-ROLL and others with predefined angles and positions.

Actually, thing is, if I manage to do this then there are 99.99% of getting me a chance to work on one big project. In that project we have approx. 14-17 feet 6 actuators. That  Stewart platform will be a inverted one. I am quite excited about that.

I request you all to please help me in this regard. I would really appreciate your help. 

Thanks in advance

[Joseph-S]

Hi aeroshantanu,

Welcome to the NI Discussion forums! I assume that you have you already figured out the necessary forward/inverse kinematic transformations required to control the platform and that your question is more along the lines of interfacing with the motors from Animatics.

Does your USB to RS232 converter show up as a COM port on your PC? If so, you can use the NI-VISA drivers to send and receive data from these COM ports. You'll have to consult Animatics documentation for the exact commands that you need to send. To send commands through LabVIEW, please refer to the example finder in LabVIEW and browse by Task to Hardware Input and Output > Serial > Basic Serial Write and Read.vi. This should help you get started with sending commands to your motors. Feel free to post back here if you have more questions!

[aeroshantanu]

Hi Joseph,

Thanks for replying.

Yes I know concept/theory behind Stewart platform geometry and how I'll get different angular positions but problems lies while using LabVIEW. I am bit lost as I already mentioned I am beginner. I am unable to figure out what to use and how to use different LabVIEW options.

I found one code(VI) while going through different discussion forum and I tried to use it for my project just to check it. It connects motor(only one motor) to LabVIEW and switches it ON. Yes I that .VI uses NI-VISA.

Yes I do know commands which Animatics motor software uses. So do you mean I have to use them while writing a program in LabVIEW? If yes then how?

I know my questions might be showing my ignorance but I would like to learn. So I request you to provide me some VI (if you have any) or any other related and useful information/VIs.

Thanks again for your reply.

Best Regards,
Shantnau