Dynamics of fluidic muscle actuated driving simulator platform

This study explores the dynamic response of a driving simulator with fluidic muscle actuators. The simulator chair utilized a Stewart platform parallel robot configuration with the movement of the muscles being controlled by PWM-operated solenoid valves. A set of microcontrollers used actuator length measurement data and pressure data to form a cascade control loop. An outer control loop supplied a force set point according to the desired joint movements and an inner control loop controlled the pressure according to the desired force. A seat and joysticks were attached to the manipulator of the Stewart platform. The desired movements of the chair were calculated based on a multiphysics simulation of a mining loader digital twin run on a separate PC. A control algorithm was developed for the muscles to move the platform to the correct position in real time.