Product category:
Linear Drives and Motors
News Release from: Philips Applied Technologies | Subject: NForcer technology
Edited by the Engineeringtalk Editorial
Team on 16 October 2007
Linear motors provide two-axis movement
Philips' NForcer technology will allow designers to reduce the number of motors and electronic drive modules required in pick and place applications.
Researchers at Philips Applied Technologies have developed a technique that allows standard linear motors to simultaneously provide movement along two axes rather than along a single axis In equipment such as the pick and place machines used to assemble electronic printed circuit boards, Philips' NForcer technology will allow designers to reduce the number of motors and electronic drive modules required as well as simplifying overall mechanical design
This article was originally published on Engineeringtalk on 20 Oct 2006 at 8.00am (UK)
Related stories
Magnetic levitation breaks free from constraints
Planar magnetic levitation motion technology features a completely free-floating platform with six degrees of freedom, unencumbered by the cables, cooling hoses and other connections.
Motor miniaturised by new coil winding technology
Asaba Engineering has developed a high-efficiency coreless miniature DC motor for motion control applications.
This will result in significantly lower equipment cost.
By reducing the mass of moving parts, it will also allow designers to produce designs that achieve higher accelerations and operating speeds.
This new innovation enables horizontally-mounted linear motors to generate lift as well as lateral motion, providing both axes of motion required in pick and place machines from just one motor.
Further reading
Drive modules offer system integrators flexibility
The first multiple drive system on a common DC bus is now available as Modules from ABB, for use by system integrators, panelbuilders and OEMs.
Quieter low power drives now go silent
ABB has introduced a user-programmable silent operating mode for its Comp-AC range of low power AC drives.
NForcer Technology also enables the production of precision magnetically levitated platforms with six axes of controlled motion by using ordinary linear motors.
"The beauty of this new innovation in linear motor operation is that it requires absolutely no modification to existing motor components", says Dr Georgo Angelis, Senior Scientist at Philips Applied Technologies.
"All you need to do is re-position the components slightly and drive them in an intelligent way".
Iron-less, multi-phase linear motors rely on the fact that a current carrying conductor placed in a magnetic field experiences a force perpendicular to the direction of the current and the direction of the field (the Lorentz force).
It is this force that creates the motion.
In a conventional linear motor, the current carrying conductors are arranged in coils, with only the vertical sides of the coils in the magnetic field.
As a result, the motor only generates lateral motion.
To achieve two-dimensional motion from one motor, the researchers at Philips Applied Technologies have shifted the position of the coils with respect to the magnet track so that the lower horizontal section of the coils also sits in the magnetic field, where it generates force and consequent motion in the vertical direction.
Because Philips' NForcer Technology can be used to implement magnetic levitation, it will allow the production of fully floating, bearing-less platforms, which, unlike air-bearing solutions, can be used in vacuum.
A fully floating, magnetically levitated (bearing-less) platform with a long-stroke x-axis, short-stroke y and z-axis movements and a few milli-radians of tilt and turn can be implemented with only four horizontal magnet tracks (stators) and six forcers (rotors).
• Philips Applied Technologies: contact details and other news
• Email this article to a colleague
• Register for the free Engineeringtalk email newsletter
• Engineeringtalk Home Page
