Improved Control for the Impact Actuator

The impact actuator uses the momentum transfer during mechanical impacts to accelerate linear feed axes. As a result, nearly abrupt changes in velocity can be achieved. So far, the impact and thus the velocity change have been idealized as abrupt within the controller. Since very high but not infinite accelerations occur, no actual jumps in velocity can be achieved, resulting in position and contour errors at corners in planned trajectories. In this paper, an extended control method is considered which takes into account these physical limitations of the approach in order to improve the system behavior. Using a reference trajectory, a comparison is made between regular trajectory planning, the previous control method with idealized impacts, and the new approach with improved control.