The main aim of this study was to decrease the weight of mobile transportation robot and to check the optimized shape using topology optimization and structural analysis. The analyses were applied using CAE (Computer Aided Engineering) Software with the methods of topology optimization and structural analysis. In the topology optimization process, the preserved areas were defined for connection and fixing areas. The aim was to decrease the weight of robot structure and lower the energy consumption of the robotic system. After topology optimization, the structural strength analysis was applied to the new optimized structure to check about the strength. The weight of the structure was decreased with the ratio of 20%. In addition to this, the structural strength of the robot was observed similar to the original body with the factor of safety value as three.

In this study, structural and dynamic analyses were applied to the mobile transportation robot to find the structural strength and to calculate the power and torque requirements. The mobile transportation robot was designed using CAD (Computer Aided Design) software as two modules; mecanum wheeled locomotion module and robotic arm module, respectively. The analyses were carried on the CAE (Computer Aided Engineering) Software using the static structural and rigid body dynamics tools. In the structural analysis, the weight of the robot and the additional load (98.1 N) were applied to the body of the robot. The material of the robot body was selected as Aluminum 6061 O sheet metal. In the dynamic analysis, the operation environment and conditions were simulated in the CAE software. The structural analysis results showed that the factor of safety value was obtained as 10.282 under applied loads and this value indicates that the chassis of mobile transportation robot is supposed to carry loads reaching up to 30 kg without any functional and mechanical problem. Furthermore, from the dynamic analysis, the total torque requirement of the mobile robot was about 16.56 Nm.