EULER PARAMETERS IN COMPUTATIONAL KINEMATICS AND DYNAMICS. PART 1 AND PART 2.

Part I of this paper presents useful and interesting identities between Euler parameters and their time derivatives. Using these identities, kinematic constraints and equations of motion for constrained mechanical systems are derived. These equations can be developed into a computer program to systematically generate all of the necessary equations to model mechanical systems. Part II represents a methodology for formulating kinematic constraint equations and equations of motion for constrained mechanical systems. An algorithm for solving the constrained equations of motion using a constraint stabilization technique is reviewed. Significant reduction in computation time can be achieved with this formulation and the accompanying algorithm as compared with the method presented in Part I.