Design and modeling of a novel 3-DOF large-travel parallel micro/nano-positioning stage

Limited travel constrains the widely application of XYZ parallel micro/nano-positioning stage. In this paper, a novel parallel-kinematics micro/nano-positioning stage is proposed with the goal of enlarging the travel range. In order to obtain a large input displacement for actuating the stage, voice coil motors (VCM) are adopted. For a large-travel parallel stage, the cross-axis motion increases the difficulty of closed-loop control process. Thus, the I-shaped flexure hinges are employed to decouple the parallel stage's motion. In view of the lower output force of the VCM, the guiding flexure mechanism is designed with an optimized sectional dimension of 140 mm × 44 mm. To verify the performance of the stage, analytical modeling and simulation study are conducted. Results show that the proposed large-travel parallel micro/nano-positioning stage owns the 3-DOF motion range of 3.527 mm, an oversize of 176 mm × 176 mm × 198 mm, and negligible isolation ratio of 0.0034%.