Static and Vibration Analyses of a Three-Dimensional Snake-Like Micropositioning Stage

This paper presets a 3 degrees of freedom (dof) piezoelectric micropositioning stage. The stage is composed of a stack of piezo disk bender actuators actuated in such a way to prevent the end-effector from rotating; this way the end-effector can only translate along the x, y, and z axis. Thanks to its snake-like configuration, the system is capable of large displacements (of the order of 50 μm) with low driving voltages (of the order of 100V). Several lumped-mass static and dynamic models of the device have been implemented. Static experimental results, which are in agreement with simulation data, confirmed the performances of the device. A dynamic model showed the natural frequencies of the mechanism . Also dynamic tests have been conducted in order to validate the dynamic model.