Linear unit

Details Linear unit Linear unit

1988-01-13

1990-05-01

Salce, Patrick R.

Electrical generator or motor structure

Dynamoelectric

Linear

H02K 4103

Patent

active

049221434

DESCRIPTION:

BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

The invention relates to a linear unit which can be used, for example, as handling equipment of industrial production, to seize an object in order to move the latter in one or more predetermined directions by certain amounts, entered in advance. For the drive of the carriage serving as a tool support, preferably electromagnetically operated linear motors are used which, with simple design, ensure a precise positioning of the carriage. Such drives with a gear rack of magnetically conducted material as motor rotor and magnetizable motor stator are known in large number. A construction described in German Offenlegungsschrift 2,247,509 uses as a gear rack a flexible strip of magnetic material, which has rectangular openings, which are arranged on the entire length perpendicular to the direction of movement, and which strip is fixed in its entire length to a solid magnetic bar, the thickness of which is sufficient for closing the magnetic flux and for transference of its movement to an outside element. In the case of a specific embodiment, two strips of magnetic material are provided, which are attached on two opposite sides of a bar of rectangular cross-section guided on roller or ball bearings. Each strip is assigned a stator, which has several pole masses, which are provided with windings and at the same time each have a toothing. The mutually facing surfaces of the tooth structures formed in the strips and the pole masses lie in two parallel planes with an intermediate space, which forms the pole gap.


SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

It is an object of this invention to provide an improved linear unit for moving objects.
The linear unit according to the invention has, in comparison, the advantage that a separate, intrinsically rigid support, requiring a precision bearing, for the strip having the tooth structure is not necessary. The stators of the linear motor on the surfaces of which, limiting the pole gap, the strip is guided with friction contacts, do not require an exact alignment with respect to the carriage to be driven, since the strip is flexible in one direction, namely transversely to the pole gap. Alignment errors are thereby compensated by the strip sections located outside the stators in the direction of displacement, without the pole gap itself experiencing any change.
Advantageous further developments and improvements of the linear unit according to the invention are also possible. A preferred embodiment consists in that the strip consisting of metal is provided with rectangular openings which predetermine the tooth structure and are arranged on the entire length perpendicular to the direction of movement of the strip, and that the guide surfaces of the strip and/or the stators are provided with a non-magnetic liner, preferably a liner of plastics. This produces an easy-action slide pairing of the components with very narrow pole gap and thus maximum motor output. The application of special liners becomes superfluous if the strip is made of a plastic and includes a tooth structure of magnetic metal. The novel features which are considered as characteristic for the invention are set forth in particular in the appended claims. The invention itself, however, both as to its construction and its method of operation, together with additional objects and advantages thereof, will be best understood from the following description of specific embodiments when read in connection with the accompanying drawings.


BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 shows a linear unit in a perspective view and
FIG. 2 shows an enlarged detail of the arrangement according to FIG. 1 in a side view.


DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

The linear unit includes a holder 1, which is designed as a tube and in which a carriage 2 is guided longitudinally displaceably. The tube 1 has a quadrilateral, preferably rectangular cross-section and is made as an extruded body, preferably of aluminium or an aluminium alloy. The carriage 2, guided displaceably in the tube 1, consists of a profil

REFERENCES:
patent: 3934183 (1976-01-01), Saufferer
patent: 4286180 (1988-08-01), Langley

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