An improved technique for reducing the fluctuation of kinetic energy in plane mechanisms

In an earlier work in collaboration with A.A. Sherwood the author presented some ideas on the optimisation of the distribution of mass in the links of mechanisms. One unfortunate aspect of this work was that the calculated distributions of mass sometimes resulted in a link with negative total mass or negative moment of inertia.

The present paper introduces a new and more powerful approach to the problem of mass distribution, using mathematical constraints on the mass and moment of inertia of the synthesised links to ensure that they can be achieved in practice. Some other deficiencies in the earlier work are also corrected.