Design, Modeling, and Experimental Evaluation of a Compact Piezoelectric XY Platform for Large Travel Range

A novel piezoelectric XY platform driven by a single actuator was presented for a large travel range and compact structure. The actuator operated at the inertial mechanism and moved the output platform step-by-step. A dynamic model of the piezoelectric actuator was established based on the Timoshenko beam theory and Galerkin procedure, which was used to aid the structure design. The dynamic model of the platform system was established based on the dynamic model of the actuator and the LuGre friction model. A prototype was fabricated and its experimental system was established; the total size was 100 × 100 × 93.5 mm³ and the travel range was 15 × 15 mm². The measured stepper motions agreed well with the simulation results, and the correctness of the dynamic model was confirmed. The proposed platform achieved maximum speeds of 2.13 and 3.11 mm/s along the axes X and Y , respectively, and a carrying capacity of 20 kg was achieved. Furthermore, the closed-loop control experiments, including the positioning resolution and the sinusoidal trajectory tracking, were carried out, and a positioning resolution better than [Formula: see text] and a tracking error rate of 4% were achieved, which revealed the potential of the proposed piezoelectric platform in field of manipulating heavy objects with submicrometer accuracy and large travel range, especially for some specific fields including microparticle manipulation, ultraprecision manufacturing, and optical device posture adjustment where large travel range, high accuracy, and multidimension are expected.