This paper presents a survey of experiments dedicated to the study of dynamicsof flexible multibody systems. Topics include verification of theories,experimental investigation on dynamics characteristics, and other test work such ascontact-impact experiment. The development of the dynamics of flexible multibody systemsinvolves three stages: Kineto-Elasto Dynamics Method (KED), traditional hybridcoordinates method and non-linear theories taking into account the dynamic stiffening effect. The relatedexperiments used for the verification of these theories are described in detail. Theexperiments on the dynamics characteristics of flexible multibodysystem, such as modalfrequencies and modal shapes and resonance researches, are also discussed. The experimentson the control of manipulator and contact-impact researches are brieflymentioned. Twokey problems in experiments are discussed in detail. One is how to measure the deformation offlexible body undergoing large overall motions, the other is how to deal with the effects ofdamping such as internal damping and air drag forces. Finally, some current and future researchdirections are pointed out. In this paper, some of experiments aredescribed with figures containingthe experiment setup and data plotting.
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