Posted to News on 15th Jul 2010, 09:23
Motor Technology celebrates 25 years of 'control in motion'
Motor Technology is 25 years old in 2010 and, to celebrate, the company is looking back at some of the most exciting projects it has been involved with during that time.
For example, Motor Technology has designed and installed systems for some of the greatest names in industry, research, education, theatre. This all dates back to the summer of 1998 when scenery fabricators Streeter & Jessel approached Motor Technology to develop a highly sophisticated automation system for, of all things, a flying mirror. However, this was not just any old mirror; this mirror was 3m high by 6m wide and weighed 1000kg! It was to form the centrepiece of the set during a performance of Life is a Dream by Spanish playwright Calderon, staged by the Lyceum Theatre Company at the Edinburgh Festival and starring Sylvester McCoy of Doctor Who fame.
In the opening scene of the play the vast mirror lies face down on the stage, covered by a large quantity of grey sand, and then rises to a height of 2m, allowing the actors to appear from a trap door underneath. Once the actors are on stage the mirror tips backwards allowing the sand to cascade from the back, creating an attractive rain-like effect. During the rest of the performance the mirror was required to move swiftly and smoothly through additional sequences before finally returning to the stage at the close of the final act.
Six-axis control
The automation system had to achieve repeatable positional accuracy of 4mm over a 9m drop, and at all times the safety of the actors on stage had to be given utmost priority. A steel gantry was therefore constructed such that it could be rigged above the stage and the mirror suspended by Bowden cables and winched into a range of positions using six axes of servo drive motion control. Motor Technology supplied the drives, motors, worm gear boxes and a user interface that was custom-designed for the application.
Eurotherm's 637 series intelligent servo drives were used, together with the local fieldbus easy-serial RS485. The user-interface provided fast positional updates for each axis, comprehensive error handling, and an intuitive operational environment that could be used to develop a performance program complete with stage cues. Any system, bus errors or emergency stops would disable the drives and isolate the power supply, activating the motors' internal brakes.
Orders were placed with Motor Technology during the first week of July and the design, construction and installation was completed by 6 August in time for the start of the festival.
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