An Adaptive Posture Following and Keeping Fixture Based on Aerostatic Bearing and Universal Ball Joint for Aircraft Digital Assembly

In order to reliably keep and fasten the aligned posture of large components such as fuselage in aircraft digital assembly, a new adaptive posture following and keeping method based on the application of aerostatic bearing and universal ball joint was proposed, and a flexible posture following and keeping fixture was developed. Fundamental experiments of the fixture were conducted, and the results show that the approach can meet the requirement of posture following and keeping. In applications, the fixture can be set multiple-point on the surface of the large component, such as periphery and lower abdomen.