Hi Alex,
1. You are right. The L port is equivalent to the R port in a traditional Mechanical Simscape block. If you want access to the C port for whichever reason, you may have to build your own "custom" Pneumo-Hydraulic actuator. In other words, combine a hydro-mechanical converter, mass, and pneumatic piston chamber from the Simscape Foundation Library.
2. I'm not sure about this one. My guess would be that the simplified equations don't require the component to keep the pressure stored internally in its equations, so you don't need initial conditions. The equations simply look at (Pa - Pb) at a particular time to figure out the force transmitted.
Again, don't quote me on this one. You could log the pressure across this cylinder block (with varying initial conditions) to test it out for yourself.
3. I think you're right here too. While the Simple block lists assumptions about friction, the documentation for the regular (non-simplified) block also lists this:
Basic Assumptions and Limitations
- No leakage, internal or external, is taken into account.
- No loading on piston rod, such as inertia, friction, spring, and so on, is taken into account. If necessary, you can easily add them by connecting an appropriate building block to cylinder port R.
- Sebastian
