Rod Drive Linear Motor Actuators Miniature Piezo High-Speed Linear Motor Stages Low-Profile XY Open-Frame Piezomotor Stages Micro Piezomotor Linear Drive PILine® Closed-Loop Piezo Motor Controllers NEXACT® Piezo Stepping Motor Actuators

• Compact Size: The direct-drive principle allows the design of ultra-compact translation stages, The P-653 for example, measures only 8 mm in length
• Low Inertia: High Acceleration, Speed and Resolution: PILine^® ultrasonic drives achieve Velocities to 800 mm/s and accelerations to 20 g. They are also very stiff, a prerequisite for their fast step-and-settle times—on the order of a few milliseconds—and provide resolution to 0.05 µm. The lack of a leadscrew means no lubricant flow and material relaxation to cause submicron creep. There is also no rotational inertia to limit acceleration and deceleration.
• Excellent Power-to-Weight Ratio: PILine^® ultrasonic drives are optimized for high performance in a minimum package. No comparable drive can offer the same combination of acceleration, speed and precision.
• Safe: PILine^® ultrasonic drives do not require limit switches. Even if driven into the hard stop, the motor will not be damaged. The minimum inertia of the moving platform together with the “slip clutch” effect of the friction drive, give excellent protection against damage.
• Precision fixtures and devices are much safer than with leadscrew-driven stages. PILine^® ultrasonic drives are also “finger-safe”: Despite the high speeds and accelerations, there is no risk of pinching or worse. This means users do not need interlocks, light curtains or other measures to keep them safe.
  AutoLock Feature: PILine^® drives create a braking force when not energized without causing the position shift common with conventional mechanical brakes. Other benefits of the AutoLock feature are the elimination of servo dither and steady-state heat dissipation.
• Vacuum Compatible: PILine^® drives are 100% ceramic and can be used in a vacuum without performance loss.
• Negligible EMI: PILine^® drives do not create magnetic fields nor are they influenced by them, a decisive advantage in many applications.
• Custom Solutions / Flexibility for OEMs: PILine^® ultrasonic drives are available in open-loop and closed-loop trans-lation stages and as OEM components. PI develops and manufactures all piezo ceramic components in-house. This gives us the flexibility to provide custom motors (size, force, environmental conditions) for OEM and research applications.
• Quality, Lifetime, Experience: Based on PI"s 30+ years of experience with piezo nanopositioning technology, PILine^® drives offer exceptional precision and reliability with an MTBF of >20,000 hours. Components such as gears, shafts and moving cables that are prone to failure in conventional motion systems, are simply not part on the PILine^® design.

Ultrasonic Piezo Motor Drives—How do they work?

In contrast to piezo-actuator-driven, flexure based piezostage nanopositioning systems, PILIne(r) ultrasonic linear piezo motors provide basically unlimited travel. They are based on a novel, patented ceramic drive developed by PI. At the heart of the system is a piezoceramic plate which is excited to produce high-frequency eigenmode oscillations. A friction tip attached to the plate moves along an inclined linear path at the eigenmode frequency. Through its contact with the friction bar, it drives the moving part of the mechanics forward or backwards. With each oscillatory cycle, the mechanics executes a step of a few nanometers; the macroscopic result is smooth motion with a virtually unlimited travel range. The driving force is taken from the energy in the longitudinal oscillation component. The transverse component serves to increase/decrease the pressure of the friction tip against the friction bar. The transverse oscillation energy determines the maximum frictional force and hence the holding and driving force of the piezo motor. PILine^® drives have no gears, spindles or other mechanical parts which could cause backlash or hysteresis. More piezo motor info.