A large thrust trans-scale precision positioning stage based on the inertial stick–slip driving

In this paper, a large thrust trans-scale precision positioning stage based on the inertial stick–slip driving is proposed, which can output long range motion. The stage consists of a piezoelectric actuator, a cross roller guide, a pair of cantilever beams, the flexure hinge system and the gather system of grating ruler, and the volume is 30 mm (L) × 17 mm (W) × 17.5 mm (H). The structure and the driving principle are introduced in detail. To investigate the working performance, a prototype is fabricated and a series of experiments is carried out. Experimental results demonstrate that the displacement outputs under various driving voltages, various driving frequencies and various step response time show good linear relationships with the time. The maximum thrust and the maximum load capacity are 6.1 N and 2500 g. The displacement and the driving resolution can reach 20 mm and 5 nm. The velocity can reach 12 mm/s when the driving frequency is 2.5 kHz. The experimental results also confirm that the designed stage can achieve various speeds by changing the driving voltage and driving frequency.