Study on the Linear Air Bearing Stage with Actively Controllable Magnetic Preload

초정밀 스테이지를 위한 능동형 자기예압 공기베어링에 관한 연구

A precise linear motion stage supported by magnetically preloaded air bearings is introduced where preloading magnetic actuators are combined with permanent magnets and coils to adjust air bearing clearance by controlling magnetic force actively. Each of the magnetic actuators has a permanent magnet generating nominal magnetic flux for required preload and a coil to perturb the magnetic force resulting adjustment of air-bearing clearance. The characteristics of porous aerostatic bearing are analyzed by numerical analysis, and analytic magnetic circuit model is driven for magnetic actuator to calculate nominal preload and variation of force due to current. A 1-axis linear stage motorized with a coreless linear motor and a linear encoder is built for verifying this design concept. With the active magnetic preloading actuators controlled with DSP board and PWM power amplifiers, the active on-line adjusting tests about the vertical, pitching and rolling motion were performed, and the result shows very good linearity.