  The paper focuses on the stiffness modeling of parallel manipulators composed
of non-perfect serial chains, whose geometrical parameters differ from the
nominal ones. In these manipulators, there usually exist essential internal
forces/torques that considerably affect the stiffness properties and also
change the end-effector location. These internal load-ings are caused by
elastic deformations of the manipulator ele-ments during assembling, while the
geometrical errors in the chains are compensated for by applying appropriate
forces. For this type of manipulators, a non-linear stiffness modeling
tech-nique is proposed that allows us to take into account inaccuracy in the
chains and to aggregate their stiffness models for the case of both small and
large deflections. Advantages of the developed technique and its ability to
compute and compensate for the compliance errors caused by different factors
are illustrated by an example that deals with parallel manipulators of the
Or-thoglide family
