Focus on surface metrology

Aerotech, manufacturer of high-performance motion control and positioning systems, has founded a new subsidiary, Peak Metrology.

The aim is to concentrate all activities around high-precision metrology. Headed by RJ Hardt, a long-time Aerotech engineer, Peak Metrology draws on Aerotech's extensive know-how in positioning systems, but focuses exclusively on supporting industrial customers with solutions for surface metrology up to complete integration.

The first exhibits from the cooperation with metrology specialist Keyence will be seen at Control 2022 from 5 to 6 May 2022 in Stuttgart, including the integration of 3D laser microscopes and Aerotech positioning system.

Rapid growth trajectory

"We have already achieved impressive successes when Peak Metrology operated as an internal division," emphasises Mark Botos, CEO of Aerotech, "and we know that the Peak Metrology team is on a rapid growth trajectory."

Both Aerotech and Peak Metrology customers are expected to benefit from the company's technological and financial resources, as well as competitive pricing and delivery times. Based at Aerotech's Pittsburgh headquarters, Peak Metrology provides product development, engineering, installation and training services. As a division of Aerotech, Peak Metrology has already built a broad customer base around standard and customised precision surface metrology solutions.

Optimal solutions for complex challenges

"We have the knowledge, experience and equipment to take on customers' complex surface metrology challenges and develop optimal solutions for them," explains RJ Hardt, president of Peak Metrology. "Industrial customers who do not specialise in surface metrology are a perfect fit for us, allowing them to focus on what they do best."

Although many Aerotech customers have a long history of success with motion control and automation equipment, they still struggle to implement a complete solution that combines the other components of a measurement tool. The real burden is to overlap the automation control with the measurement technology and the supporting user interface software and round it off into a complete solution.

Peak Metrology points to its wide range of products for surface metrology applications, including turnkey machines. Surface analysis is often integrated directly into the production chain as a quality assurance process – for example, in semiconductor production during wafer inspection or the manufacture of flat panels.

Here, the quality is assessed after almost every process step, for which a fully automated in-process inspection with object feeding, measurement and subsequent further processing is usually triggered.

Precise synchronisation vital

It is essential that measuring and positioning cycles are precisely synchronised. Users benefit, among other things, from high-performance linear and rotary tables, as well as controls with position-synchronous triggering of the sensor.

"The positioning and sequence accuracy of the motion system has a decisive effect on the measurement results," states RJ Hardt, head of the newly founded Peak Metrology Systems business unit at Aerotech. "Therefore, it is a logical consequence for us to now pull together the know-how gathered over decades around motion systems and metrology in a separate business unit." The goal is to be able to support manufacturers of measurement technology even better.