Hardware-in-the-loop simulation is an increasingly popular engineering tool for its effectiveness in maintaining a balance between the two competing demands of: a) well designed and thoroughly tested systems, and b) reduced development time and costs to remain competitive. This paper proposes an architecture for applying hardware-in-the-loop simulation techniques to the design and testing of robot manipulators. Potential benefits of this architecture include allowing concurrent development of hardware and control system components and providing a reusable platform for reconfigurable manipulators through a generic and modular structure. An implementation of this architecture in the preliminary phases of development is presented here to demonstrate how these benefits can be realized. © 2006 IEEE.