Aerotech’s ABL 1000 series miniature air bearing stages are designed for ultra-high performance alignment applications in semiconductor manufacture, fibre optics, photonics, MEMS and nanotechnology. Available in travel ranges of 25 mm, 50 mm, 100 mm and 150 mm, the miniature stages include non-contact linear brushless servo motors and linear encoders for completely friction free performance with speeds to 300 mm/sec and positioning resolution as low as 1.0 nm with the A3200 Digital Automation Platform control system.
All Aerotech air bearings include an active preload on both vertical and horizontal surfaces with opposing thin-film pressure maintaining the air gap over maximum sized bearing surfaces. This design results in excellent stiffness and an inherent averaging effect where the thin film will fill small surface voids resulting in superior pitch, roll, yaw, and straightness and flatness specifications.
The ABL1000 uses, brushless cog-free, linear motors with Ndrive HL series linear amplifiers offering improved stability and much lower noise when compared to PWM based servo drives. Direct drive linear motors are inherently faster in acceleration and top speed than leadscrew driven stages. They provide exceptionally smooth slow-speed and precise step and repeat positioning performance with zero backlash, no hysterisis and excellent in-position stability. The non contact design combines well with air bearings and linear encoders for an extremely long life with minimal maintenance.
A choice of linear encoders is available providing a nominal positional accuracy of 1 μm or 2 μm. When combined Aerotech’s HALAR option with interferometer based calibration of each axis, the 25 mm travel version boasts accuracy to within +/- 0.2 μm. Specifications for repeatability are +/- 50 nm and the straightness and flatness differential is 0.25 μm per 25 mm travel. Pitch, roll and yaw are within 25 arc-sec over 25 mm.
The ABL1000's miniature design includes 25 mm, 50 mm and 100 mm travel stages in a 160 mm wide platform with maximum length of 310 mm for the longest travel stage. The 150 mm travel version is slightly wider at 185 mm with overall length of 407 mm. Maximum individual load is 15 kg reduced to 10 kg for an X-Y configured stage. An integral cable management system simplifies installation. Control options for the ABL1000 include the A3200 Digital Automation Platform, a software based machine control system combining motion, HMI, PLC and vision control modules with an industry standard Firewire® high performance communication network for up to 32 axes of high speed motion; additionally a 10/100 Base T Ethernet interface may be used to add third party I/O and PLC's.
The A3200 can be configured for fast photonic alignment applications with built-in power optimisation routines with interfacing to industry standard power meters. Integrated vision systems are also available for automating fibre optic production processes or for rapid product and application development. Aerotech's Virtual Pivot Point Software™ uses reverse kinematics principles to compensate for moment errors in multi-axis linear and rotary alignment systems that typically slow down the alignment process and increase the time taken to optimise power coupling. The software simultaneously makes a compensation move during alignment ensuring that production throughput is maximised.
Aerotech's complete systems include all motor power and encoder cables plus performance and calibration related documents and a CD containing interconnection drawings to help integrators with their own system documentation; all motor parameter set-up data for system configuration is included, making commissioning straightforward. These features are standard for every Aerotech system and with full product training and comprehensive on-line technical support, the true cost of ownership is extremely competitive.
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