SYNAMEC

Synthesis Tool for Aeronautical Mechanisms Design

The objective of this project is to build an integrated general-purpose software for the structural (type) and dimensional syntheses of mechanisms, starting for a specification of functional requirements.

The same tool may be used during the complete design work, not only during the type synthesis from scratch but also during the dimensional optimisation of the meshed mechanism. The objective function may be path generation, function generation, rigid-body guidance and/or any combination thereof. Constraints on occupied area, volume and/or displacement (i.e. territorial constraints) are applied at this stage. New software to be developed will add functionality to the existing software already owned by partners and currently used in industry. The developed methods and tools will be applied to practical industrial cases in the field of aeronautics.

The software development activities will be executed in four stages:

1. Firstly, a complete specification of the entire system to be developed will be made.
2. The 2^nd step will be the separate development of six functional modules.
3. The 3^rd step will be the integration and concurrent development of the separate prototypes within the SYNAMEC system. This integrated system will perform the synthesis and analysis of aeronautical mechanisms
4. The 4^th step will be an extension of this integrated system to perform optimisation tasks.

The development activities will be based on several existing software prototypes owned by the consortium partners, which will guarantee a stable foundation and reduces the risk of the development activities.

The main project output will be a software demonstrator for conceptual and detailed design of aeronautical mechanisms. The consortium will deliver the research and development work in 8 work packages. WP1 is for the complete system specification. WP2 up to WP5 will develop the different functional modules. WP6 will test the software demonstrators. Two WPs are added, one for the exploitation and dissemination of results and the other for the project management.

Expected results

Four milestones will indicate progress on the expected main results:

• System specification,
• Standalone software prototypess for:
  - type synthesis
  - computation of sensitivities
  - configuration generation
  - expert advisor
  - generation of alternatives
  - performance evaluation,
• Integrated software prototype for synthesis of aeronautical mechanisms,
• Demonstrator software for aeronautical mechanisms synthesis and optimisation.