Ch Mechanism Toolkit

Ch Mechanism Toolkit is an application that enables you to design or analyze various linkage and four-bar mechanisms and determine potential issues as well as their solutions.

First off, it is important to note that you need to have the Ch Professional or Student installed on your computer in order to run the application. Upon launch, you are welcomed by an unpolished, yet well-structured interface that is also relatively easy to navigate.

The program comes with numerous tools that enable you to write the code for the mechanism you want to test as well as run, parse, debug or animate the file to analyze things better. The program includes various editing options, such as advanced search, bookmarking and change font size for instance, that can help you create an appropriate environment for writing codes using complex equations.

It is necessary to mention that the program allows you to preview your project via animations that can be run directly in your computer or through the Internet. You can create animations for the mechanisms you are analyzing by using the QuickAnimation function in Ch. You will be happy to learn that these files are easy to interpret, meaning that you need to pay attention to the open and filled circles that represent the joints and respectively, the coupler points.

In case you are unable or do not prefer animations, then you can have the output displayed or exported to various external files, including but not limited to LaTeX, PNG or Postscript, for example. Alternatively, you can copy and paste the schematics in other third-party software solutions.

Generally speaking, to solve design or analyze possible linkage problems you first need to know how to solve complex equations. While Ch Mechanism Toolkit enables you to diagnose mechanisms, you still need to know how to write the code that enables the app to test them out.