ABL1500Z Air-Bearing Direct-Drive Lift Stage

Description

Design Features

• Designed for high-performance scanning and inspection
• Active air preload on all air-bearing surfaces
• Linear encoder feedback provides sub-nanometer resolution
• High stiffness for heavy loads and excellent geometrical performance
• Four models with travels from 50 to 200 mm
• Integral counterbalance

Leading-edge manufacturing, particularly in the semiconductor and data storage industries, demands positioning tolerances beyond the capability of conventional ball-screw and mechanical-bearing positioning systems. The ABL1500Z, with its fully active preload, exceptionally high stiffness and excellent geometric characteristics, was designed specifically to meet those demands.

Air-Bearing Design for High Dynamic Performance

The ABL1500Z incorporates an air-on-air preload on both the vertical and horizontal surfaces. The opposing thin-film pressure maintains the bearing nominal gap tolerance. This design, in addition to the large air-bearing surface that distributes the load over a large surface area, results in a stage with outstanding stiffness that is ideal for heavy or offset loading.

Aerotech's proprietary manufacturing techniques result in a stage with unsurpassed geometric characteristics, which maximize performance by yielding superior pitch, roll, yaw, straightness and flatness specifications.

Zero-Cogging Linear Motor Drive

The driving force behind this stage is Aerotech's BLMC series brushless linear servomotor. The BLMC utilizes an ironless forcer, which means there is zero cogging and no attractive forces, resulting in unsurpassed smoothness of motion.

No Maintenance

Our totally noncontact air bearing, noncontact linear motor drive and noncontact feedback device ensure years of maintenance-free operation at the high performance levels expected of Aerotech equipment. Because there is no mechanical contact between moving elements, the ABL1500Z experiences no wear or reduction in performance over time. Service life is virtually unlimited and because there is no lubrication – only clean, dry gas – air bearings are ideal for cleanroom and medical applications.

Cable Management

We carefully optimize the cable bend radius to ensure years of trouble-free operation. In the unlikely event of failure, Aerotech's modular design makes cable replacement quick and easy with minimal downtime.

We include all customer-required cables, air hoses, etc. in our CMS bundle to facilitate integration into the final system. Both ends are fully connectorized for simple integration into the customer's machine.