Concept System and Application of Point Group Symmetry in Mechanical Structure Design

Abstract

Symmetry has been widely and deeply researched in basic science, and many mature results have been obtained so far. However, the widespread existence of symmetry in applied science is not in direct proportion to the attention it has received. Through a large number of examples studies, almost all mechanical structures are found to have symmetry, and most of them have the characteristics of point group symmetry. Therefore, the concept of point group symmetry in crystallography was extended to the field of machinery and adjusted according to the mechanical structures. First of all, the classification of mechanical point group symmetry is proposed, and how point group symmetry is applied in machinery is illustrated with examples. Then, the requirements of symmetry are analyzed and compared. Furthermore, the data mining software RapidMiner is used to mine the association rules between requirements and symmetry. Based on the mining results, the four selection principles of point group symmetry are summarized to provide ideas for structure design. Finally, a new type of gear pump with radial force balancing is invented by comprehensively using the mining results and selection principles.