Development of Al Based Loader-Backhoe Design/Analysis Software

Loader-backhoes are widely used construction equipment with very special but well defined configuration. To facilitate design and analysis of these machines, an Al (artificial intelligence) and symbolic manipulation based software package is being developed in MATHEMATICA and used at JI CASE. The package is dedicated for design/analysis of hydraulic controlled loader and backhoe linkage system which integrates all analysis in kinematics, statics, dynamics and hydraulics together, conducts comprehensive sensitivity study as well as design optimization and linkage synthesis, and provides user-friendly graphical output. Both inputs of design parameters and outputs of machine performance data are in the format to comply with design practice and SAE standards. Modularity approaches are utilized to make the software easy to use, efficient to execute and flexible to expand. In this paper, the basic algorithm and structure of the package will be discussed and several applications will be presented.