Posted to News on 28th Jan 2008, 21:09
High-speed rotary stage offers exceptional precision
Aerotech is releasing a new low-profile, high-speed rotary stage that offers a compact alternative to traditional positioning spindles. Capable of a top speed of 2500rpm and with a fundamental angular resolution of 3.6arc-sec, the ADRH 100 features backlash- and cog-free, direct-drive servo motor technology with a directly coupled precision encoder for excellent servo bandwidth and maximum stiffness.
The innovative mechanical bearing system makes use of Aerotech's highly developed rotary stage design expertise to maintain a low height while providing minimal runout and wobble. With synchronous error motions of 2um, asynchronous error motions of 4um and a tilt error of just 15arc-sec, the ADRH 100 has an overall height around 55mm and a tabletop diameter of less than 105mm.
Aerotech has developed this new stage for high-precision bidirectional speed and position control, high-speed motion contouring, and rapid angular position indexing applications as required in disk drive testing, precision wafer inspection and high-speed imaging. It is claimed that the stage will outperform the acceleration and positioning stability performance of traditional gear- and belt-driven rotary spindle mechanisms, as well as offering extremely long life and low maintenance for high-throughput 24/7 production and test applications.
The ADRH 100 is also available in customised OEM versions wherein further space saving may be made by adapting cable management, mounting configuration or other characteristics to suit the customer's mechanics.
Motion control and servo drive options
A wide range of motion controls and high-performance servo drives are available for use with the ADRH 100. Aerotech's A3200 Digital Automation Platform is a PC-based software machine control system that combines motion control, HMI, PLC and vision control modules. Based upon the industry-standard Firewire communication network, it may control up to 32 axes of high-speed motion via its distributed control architecture with deterministic position, velocity, and time commands to Aerotech's DSP-based Ndrive digital servo amplifiers. The A3200 is built to simplify complex, tightly synchronised motion and machine control functions with a choice of software including powerful .NET programming, RS-274 G-code, high-level AeroBASIC ™ or optional LabVIEW ™.
Aerotech's Soloist standalone digital servo controller range is an integrated motion control and PWM brushless servo amplifier for use in a single-axis arrangement or as part of a co-ordinated point-to-point multi-axis motion system as an Ethernet-based distributed drive with high-level or .NET programming capability.
For standalone multi-axis motion control, Aerotech's Ensemble ™ Epaq is a competitively priced, fully integrated six-axis desktop or 19inch rack-mounted motion control and drive system. With integral 10A peak digital PWM or linear amplifiers and machine I/O, the Epaq is capable of driving and controlling linear and rotary brushless, brushed or micro-stepping motors and may be expanded to control a further three external drives, offering nine axes of completely co-ordinated motion and machine control.
