Compared to conventional machining (CM), ultrasonic vibration-assisted machining (UVAM) with high-frequency and small-amplitude has exhibited good cutting performances for advanced materials. In recent years, advances in ultrasonic generator, ultrasonic transducer, and horn structures have led to the rapid progress in the development of UVAM. Following this trend, numerous new design requirements and theoretical concepts have been proposed and studied successively, however, very few studies have been conducted from a comprehensive perspective. To address this gap in the literature and understanding the development trend of UVAM, a critical overview of UVAM is presented in this study, covering different vibration-assisted machining styles, device architectures, and theoretical analysis. This overview covers the evolution of typical hardware systems used to achieve vibratory motions from the one-dimensional UVAM to three-dimensional UVAM, the discussion of cutting characteristics with periodic separation between the tools and workpiece and the analysis of processing properties. Challenges for UVAM include ultrasonic vibration systems with high power, large amplitude, and high efficiency, as well as theoretical research on the dynamics and cutting characteristics of UVAM. Consequently, based on the current limitations and challenges, device improvement and theoretical breakthrough play a significant role in future research on UVAM.

Review of ultrasonic vibration-assisted machining in advanced materials

Precision positioning systems with large working stroke (millimeter or more) and micro/nano-scale positioning resolution are widely required in both scientific research and industries. For this kind of applications, piezoelectric materials based actuators show unique advantages and have been widely employed. To overcome the demerit of the limited working stroke for single piezoelectric element, various stepping motion principles have been proposed in the past years, and accordingly, stepping piezoelectric actuators with various structures have been designed and evaluated. This review is aimed to summarize the recent developments and achievements in stepping piezoelectric actuators with large working stroke. Especially, the emphasis is on three main types of stepping piezoelectric actuators, i.e., inchworm type, friction-inertia type, and parasitic type. The motion principles of these three types of piezoelectric actuators and the corresponding developments of various actuators are discussed respectively, followed by pointing out the existing problems in these three types of piezoelectric actuators and proposing some potential research directions in this topic. It is expected that this review is helpful for relevant researchers to understand stepping motion principles as well as piezoelectric actuators, and to successfully select and design stepping piezoelectric actuators for specific applications.

Stepping piezoelectric actuators with large working stroke for nano-positioning systems: A review

A piezoelectric-driven actuator based on coupling motion has been proposed and tested to achieve a large linear working stroke with high resolution. “Z-shaped” flexure hinges are exploited for the symmetric flexure hinge mechanism to reduce the structural stress. Coupling motion is obtained by placing this symmetric flexure hinge mechanism with an angle of $\theta =20^\circ $ to the slider. Experimental results indicate that linear motion with a large working stroke is effectively obtained by this coupling motion; the maximum motion speed is $V_{s}=$ 6057 μm/s and the maximum output force is $F_{g}=$ 350 g. Additionally, the influences of input frequency $f$ and input voltage $U_{e}$ are investigated, and the system kinetic model is established to better analyze the performance of this designed piezoelectric-driven linear actuator.

A Piezoelectric-Driven Linear Actuator by Means of Coupling Motion

\n Flexure-based compliant mechanisms are becoming increasingly promising in precision engineering, robotics, and other applications due to the excellent advantages of no friction, no backlash, no wear, and minimal requirement of assembly. Because compliant mechanisms have inherent coupling of kinematic-mechanical behaviors with large deflections and/or complex serial-parallel configurations, the kinetostatic and dynamic analyses are challenging in comparison to their rigid-body counterparts. To address these challenges, a variety of techniques have been reported in a growing stream of publications. This paper surveys and compares the conceptual ideas, key advances, and applicable scopes, and open problems of the state-of-the-art kinetostatic and dynamic modeling methods for compliant mechanisms in terms of small and large deflections. Future challenges are discussed and new opportunities for extended study are highlighted as well. The presented review provides a guide on how to select suitable modeling approaches for those engaged in the field of compliant mechanisms.

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Kinetostatic and Dynamic Modeling of Flexure-Based Compliant Mechanisms: A Survey

A novel hybrid actuation mechanism based XY nanopositioning stage with totally decoupled kinematics

The limited degrees of freedom (DOFs) of servo motions is an inherent deficiency in conventional, fast-tool-servo-(FTS)-assisted, diamond-turning, highly blocking applications of the FTS technique. In this paper, the concept of two-DOF FTS (2-DOF FTS)-assisted diamond turning is proposed and demonstrated. A piezoelectrically actuated 2-DOF FTS mechanism is developed to enable the cutting tool to move along two directions with decoupled motions. A novel guidance flexural mechanism constructed using the newly proposed Z-shaped flexure hinges (ZFHs) is introduced to generate motions along the z -axis, which is based on the bending deformation of the beams of the ZFHs. Additionally, using the differential moving principle (DMP), bi-directional motions in the x -axis direction can be achieved. Using the matrix-based compliance modeling method, the kinematics of the mechanism are analytically described, and the dynamics are also modeled using the Lagrangian principle. The theoretical results are then verified using finite element analysis (FEA). Certain increases in performances over conventional two-DOF flexural mechanisms are achieved: (a) a more compact structure with lower moving inertia, (b) theoretically decoupled motions of the output end, and (c) less than one actuator per DOF. To investigate the practical performance of the 2-DOF FTS system, both open-loop and closed-loop tests are conducted. Finally, the developed 2-DOF FTS technique is implemented to realize an innovative Pseudo-Random Diamond Turning (PRDT) method for the fabrication of micro-structured surfaces with scattering homogenization. The cutting results demonstrate not only the superiority of the concept but also the efficiency of the developed 2-DOF FTS system.

Development of a piezoelectrically actuated two-degree-of-freedom fast tool servo with decoupled motions for micro-/nanomachining

Various types of flexure hinges have been introduced and implemented in a variety of fields due to their superior performances. The Castigliano’s second theorem, the Euler-Bernoulli beam theory based direct integration method and the unit-load method have been employed to analytically describe the elastic behavior of flexure hinges. However, all these methods require prior-knowledge of the beam theory and need to execute laborious integration operations for each term of the compliance matrix, thus highly decreasing the modeling efficiency and blocking practical applications of the modeling methods. In this paper, a novel finite beam based matrix modeling (FBMM) method is proposed to numerically obtain compliance matrices of flexure hinges with various shapes. The main concept of the method is to treat flexure hinges as serial connections of finite micro-beams, and the shearing and torsion effects of the hinges are especially considered to enhance the modeling accuracy. By means of matrix calculations, complete compliance matrices of flexure hinges can be derived effectively in one calculation process. A large number of numerical calculations are conducted for various types of flexure hinges with different shapes, and the results are compared with the ones obtained by conventional modeling methods. It demonstrates that the proposed modeling method is not only efficient but also accurate, and it is a more universal and more robust tool for describing elastic behavior of flexure hinges.

A simple compliance modeling method for flexure hinges

Various types of flexure hinges have been developed to construct flexural mechanisms, however, all these hinges may have limited moving accuracies, blocking performance improvements of the flexural mechanisms. In this paper, a novel sort of exponent-sine-shaped flexure hinges (ESSFHs) with asymmetric structures is proposed to achieve much higher motion accuracy. To characterize elastic deformation behavior of the ESSFHs, a novel finite beam based matrix modeling (FBMM) method is employed to calculate the compliance matrix and the defined non-dimensional precision factors without executing laborious integration operations. Furthermore, finite element analysis is conducted and compared with the FBMM method, the maximum deviation of the obtained compliances and the precision factors by the two methods is less than 8%, well demonstrating the efficiency of the analytical method. Comparisons of the accuracies of the ESSFHs and certain state-of-the-art flexure hinges verify that the proposed ESSFHs can not only significantly improve the motion accuracy but also decrease the inherent parasitic motions of conventional flexure hinges. Based on the established analytical models, influences of the dimensional parameters on the compliances and the motion accuracy of the ESSFHs are well revealed. Finally, performances of the ESSFH and the efficiency of the analytical model are well investigated by means of experimental tests.

Development of a novel sort of exponent-sine-shaped flexure hinges.

A new apparatus is proposed for the freeform surface diamond machining on die steel in this paper. Fast tool servo-based diamond turning is considered to be the most effective and efficient generating technology for freeform surfaces, but freeform surfaces of die steel cannot be machined very effectively by this technology because of the severe tool wear and the surface quality degradation. Elliptical vibration cutting has demonstrated excellent performances in machining die steel materials. Therefore, this paper proposes a double-frequency elliptical vibration cutting apparatus, which combines fast tool servo and elliptical vibration cutting. The device is designed to be a flexure hinge structure and driven by two piezoelectric actuators to generate tool motions. A series of testing experiments are conducted, in which the device performs well. In addition, the freeform surfaces are generated on the 40Cr die steel workpieces with the device, and the surface machined by double-frequency elliptical vibration cutting shows much better surface integrity and form accuracy than the surface machined by conventional fast tool servo, which validates the principle and the proposed apparatus.

Development of a double-frequency elliptical vibration cutting apparatus for freeform surface diamond machining

Locally resonant acoustic metamaterials with multi-resonators are generally regarded as a fine trend for managing the bandgaps, the different effects of relevant structural parameters on the bandgaps, which will be numerically investigated in this paper. A two-step homogenization method is extended to achieve the effective mass of multi-resonators metamaterial in the lattice system. As comparison, the dispersive wave propagation in lattice system and continuum model is studied. Then, the different effects of relevant parameters on the center frequencies and bandwidth of bandgaps are perfectly revealed, and the steady-state responses in the continuum models with purposed relevant parameters are additionally clarified. The related results can well confirm that the bandgaps exist around the undamped natural frequencies of internal resonators, and also their bandwidth can be efficiently controlled with the ensured center frequencies. Moreover, the design of purposed multi-resonators acoustic metamaterial in vibration control is presented and discussed by an example.

Rongqi Wang

Papers

Development of a piezoelectrically actuated two-degree-of-freedom fast tool servo with decoupled motions for micro-/nanomachining

A simple compliance modeling method for flexure hinges

Development of a novel sort of exponent-sine-shaped flexure hinges.

Development of a double-frequency elliptical vibration cutting apparatus for freeform surface diamond machining

Effects of relevant parameters on the bandgaps of acoustic metamaterials with multi-resonators