PIEZOELECTRIC ACTUATOR OR MOTOR, METHOD THEREFOR AND METHOD FOR FABRICATION THEREOF

Abstract: The present invention discloses an actuator or motor comprising electromechanical material altering its shape under the influence of an electric field, whereby motion relative to a body is created by non-resonant repetition of small steps. The actuator or motor comprises at least one monolithic module with electrodes integrated in said electromechanical material. The monolithic module has at least one passive part (1) and at least one active element (2), whereby at least two independent contact points at the active element/elements (2) are provided against the moving body. The contact points are positionable independently of each other in at least two independent directions relative to the passive part (1) of the monolithic module. The monolithic module is used by itself or in combination with other modules for creating the motion relative to the body. The invention also discloses a method for driving the modules. A method for fabrication of an actuator or motor of the above described type is also disclosed. That fabrication method comprises replication of geometrical shapes into a green body of said electromechanical material.

Description: PIEZOELECTRIC ACTUATOR OR MOTOR, METHOD THEREFOR AND METHOD FOR FABRICATION THEREOF TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION The invention relates to small motors and actuators comprising electro-mechanical materials which alters its shape under the influence of an electric field. In particular the invention relates to motors and actuators in which the motion relative another boαy is created by repetition of small steps. The in¬ vention also relates to a method of driving such motors and to a method for manufacturing the motors. RELATED ART There is a great need for high performance motors m the size range below a few millimetres, motors of the kind which should be able to create linear and/or rotating motion. It is often desirable that this kind of motors both have a high precision and can exert large forces. One may realize that since reli¬ able and cneap motors of this kind is requested for e.g. driv¬ ing cameras, hard disks, CD-players etc the potential market is huge. Also m the area of medical instrumentation, e.g. pumps, sucn motors are of great interest. In the state of the art, various devices based on electrome¬ chanical materials exist. Electromechanical materials have the interesting property of changing its shape when they are in¬ fluenced fc_ an electric field. Pieces of electromechanical ma¬ terials, fixed to a base plate will therefore move their non fixed surfaces when electric fields are applied to them. Such motions, contractions or expansions, may be used for con- strυcting Different types of motors or actuators. Techniques often used for motors in the size range one centi¬ meter and above are referred to as ultrasonic motor techiques. Other terms often used for the same kind of devices are reso- nance, vibration, travelling wave or impact motor devices. Typically, n such motors, electromechanical materials impose a resonance vibration into itself and a solid piece material, normally a metal block. In e.g. a travelling wave motor, pro¬ truding portions of the metal block are forced into an ellip- tical movement, and another object m contact with these pro¬ truding portions is forced to move in accordance with these movements . When going to miniature motors, this technique will be disadvantageous, since the movements become too small and limited by a non-controllable surface topography etc. A more appropriate approach to miniature motors based on elec¬ tromechanical materials is to use devices which operate off the inherent resonance. One particular actuation principle which has a great potential to fulfil the demands for such mo- tors is an Inchworm * type of motor (M. Bexell, A.-L. Tiensuu, J-A. Schweitz, J. Soderkvist, and S. Johansson, Sensors and Actuators A, 43 (1994) 322-329) . The motion is created by repetition of small steps m a similar way to the insect inch- worm, hence the name (The micropositioning book. Fishers, NY: Burleigh Instruments, Inc. (1990) ) . This motion principle will m the remaining part of this appplication be referred to as a "non-resonance step" technique, to be distinguished from the above descπoed ultrasonic techniques. Portions of electrome¬ chanical material may also be referred to as PZT. The principle for this motion is simple. A moving body is held between two claws, one on each side of the moving bod . Each claw consists of a longitudinal piece of PZT, substantially parallel to tne moving body, and at each end a transversal PZT is present. Tne PZT:s are assembled onto metal bodies. Assum- mg all of the transversal PZT:s are energized and expanded in the start position, gripping the moving body, the two opposite front transversal PZT:s are recontracted, loosing the grip of the moving body. An electrical field is applied to the longi- tudmal PZT:s, expanding their lenghts, and the front trans¬ versal PZT:s are subsequently forced to expand again, gripping the moving body at a new position. The rear transversal PZT:s loose their grip of the moving body and the longitudinal PZT:s are allowed to contract again, whereafter the rear PZT:s again grip the body. The result of such a cycle is that the moving body has moved relative to the two claws. An electronic control device is needed for a controlled opera¬ tion of the above actuator. The electronics should supply the different PZT:s with appropriate voltages in an appropriate order. Since such a sequence of voltages can be repeated very fast, a relatively fast movement is possible to obtain despite the small step size. There are some crucial factors limiting the development of ex¬ isting products based on the non-resonance step principle. Among the limits there is the difficulty of achieving a suffi¬ cient stroke of the individual actuating elements and the need for a costly high precision assembly of the elements and other parts m the system. Some solutions to these problems have been presented in the Swedish Patent Application No. 9300305-1 by Johansson. Using actuating elements with at least a two- axial motion capacity, the number of elements has been re¬ duced. At the same time motion magnification by internal lev- ers (e.g. bimorphs) in the elements can be included which gives a large freedom in design. According to these ideas a miniature motor has been built and has proven to present the desired high torque and motion capacity as predicted (M. Bex¬ ell and S. Johansson, Transducers, Stockholm, Sweden (1995) 528 - News) . By the above mentioned solution, a motion relative to another body may be acheived in the following way. Four active ele¬ ments of electromechanical material are mounted on a passive base plate, normally made of silicon, and the moving body is held against the protruding active elements. All elements con¬ sist of two vertically divided controlled portions of PZT, both extendmg between the base plate and the moving body. By applying a voltage resulting m an electrical field m the horisontal direction to the first portion of the PZT but not to the other portion, one part is tending to contract in the vertical direction, while the other is unaltered. Since the two portions are mechanically integrated into one piece, the active element will subsequently bend towards the side of the live portion. If both portions are energized, the whole ele¬ ment will contract, and if only the second PZT is imposed by a voltage, the element will bend in the other direction. By varying the voltage in the different portions, a contact point on the top of the active element can travel along any path withm a rhombic area. A "contact point" is of course not a point in a mathematical sense, but rather a small "contact area" depending on the actual geometries and normal forces, and these expressions are in the present description used in a synonomous manner. By using four active elements arranged after each other, m the direction of the sidewise movement, a moving action on the body can be acheived. By letting the first and third elements move in phase, and moving the second and fourth elements out of phase, a non-resonance step motion similar to the above de¬ scribed, is acheived. At present, this motor gives the highest torque per volume of all presently known miniature motors. There are some disadvan- tages even with this construction, which is the origin of the present invention. In the previous patent application the mo ¬ tor, for instance, consisted of active elements mounted on a substrate, and typically soldering has been used as the assem ¬ bling method. This is a fairly time consuming operation and therefore costly. Most applications demand however that the price of each motor should be very low. The above patent application, bimorph or multimorph elements were used to obtain two-axial motion and at the same time pos- sibility for stroke magnification. The disadvantage with a single clamped bimorph is that the force capacity is greatly reduced comparison with an ideal lever, which is the reason why these types of elements normally are used for positioning when there is no considerable need for forces. A double clamped bimorph, a curved membrane or an arch-shaped structure have a better force capacity for a given stroke magnification, as disclosed the U.S. Patent No. 5,589,725. However, no completely satisfying design for these leverage structures has been presented yet. Either they are too expensive to produce (for mstance assembling) or the performance is not suffi¬ cient. One important application for miniature motors as catheter type of instruments (for medical use) . The problem is how to control the shape of a long narrow tube. Either the tube is the instrument itself or is an aid for other catheter type of instruments. There exist only a few suggestions or examples of how to control the motion of a tube type structure of dimen¬ sions less than a diameter of 5 mm. All suggestions have obvi- ous disadvantages. Either the motion is too slow, the tube too weak or results in too much heating. Mϋltilayered structures of piezoelectric materials conven- tially are fabricated in a following manner. A green tape is made by tape casting a mixture of piezoelectric powder and a polymer binder. An electrode pattern is defined by screen printing a metal paste on to the green tape. The multilayer is made by laminating these tapes and subsequently heat treat the structure in two steps, first a polymer burn out and secondly sintering, to create a monolithic unit. The outer shape is most commonly cut by a sharp wedge m the green state but other shaping techniques, such as drilling, cutting and punch¬ ing, could be used as well. The contacts to the different electrode layers are made subsequently to the sintering by printing or painting metal paste on the sides, orthogonally to the layers, and a subsequent heat treatment of the paste forms a metal . In a major part of the future applications for miniature mo- tors the fabrication has to be cheap. Present microfabrication techniques are rather expensive and yet far from suited for making cheap active components. The ma needs are electrode patterning and electric mterlayer connection in the electro- active material. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION One object ot the present invention is to provide a motor or actuator, using the non-resonance step principle, which com- prises as small a number of separate elements as possible, maintaining or improving the precision of the motion of the device. It is also an object of the present invention to pro ¬ vide manufacturing methods for such motors or actuators. Another object of the present invention is to provide a motor or actuator which can be further miniaturised. A further object of the present invention is to provide a mo¬ tor or actuator, which can achieve a large range of combined motions. The above objects are acheαved by a motor or actuator accord ¬ mg to claim 1. An actuator or motor comprises electromechani ¬ cal material providing the moving action, whereby the motion is created by repeatedly performing small steps. The actuator comprises at least one monolithic module with electrodes inte ¬ grated in the electromechanical material. The term "monolithic" will m this description stand for one single in ¬ tegral body, finally integrated by a heat treatment, e.g. a sintered block of different materials. The actuator has at least two contact points with a moving body, contact points of which can be positioned independently of each other relative to a passive part in the monolithic module in at least two in¬ dependent directions. The module can by itself or in comoma- tions with other modules be used for moving another body. The manufacturing method according to the present invention is a method for creating complex electrode arrangements in a ce¬ ramic body, such as an electromechanical material, which method comprises replication of a geometrical shape into a polymer tape with grams of electromechanical material. This replication accomplishes the three dimensional patterning of the moαules. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS The invention will now be described m more detail with refer¬ ence to the accompanying drawings, in which Figure 1 is a preferred embodiment of a hexagonal, monolithic structure according to the invention; Figure 2 illustrates an embodiment the form of a tube, witn controllable shape; Figure 3 is a variant of the embodiment according to Fig. 2 including a concentric inner tube with a peristaltic internal motion; Figure 4 shows an embodiment allowing a combined rotating and linear motion; Figure 5 shows an arch-shaped structure with an improved force capacity for a given stroke magnification; Figure 6 illustrates a rolling process to define the shape of an electroactive tape; Figure 7 shows some of the resulting geometries of a plasti¬ cally deformed tape of electroactive material coated with an electrode layer; Figure 8 shows a further method of producing an actuator ac¬ cordmg to the invention; and Figure 9 shows alignment geometries in films used as starting materials. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS A preferred embodiment of the invention is illustrated Fig. 1, which discloses a monolithic module integrating all the ac ¬ tive elements. The monolithic module can be described m terms of a larger hexagonal mechanically passive part 1 and active elements 2, which are mtegral parts of the module. Therefore none of the parts shown m Figure 1 are possible to dismount, since they together form the monolithic module. The active elements 2 are arranged to be m contact with, or at least in the vicinity of the surface of the body which is supposed to be moved relative to the module (not shown m the figure) . Each element 2 consists of an electromechanical material, preferably piezoelectric, which typically is a multilayered structure. An electromechanical material responds to a certain electrical field applied across it. In order to have a large shape change upon applying the voltage, the electrical field in each portion of the material has to be high. For a non- layered material, a single voltage has to be applied across the whole structure, why the requested voltages have to be very high. One of the advantages with a layered structure is that the necessary voltages to achieve a particular electrical field becomes lower, which is desired for the matching of the structure with, e.g., the drive electronics. This is accom- plished by introducing electrode and earth layers withm the material. Upon supplying a relatively low voltage to each electrode, the local electrical field can still be high enough for a large shape change. A possible configuration of such a layered structure is shown m the upper part of Figure 1, where an enlarged sketch of one of the elements is shown. Electrical contacts 17 I - 17 VI are connected to electrodes 16 I - 16 VI and a ground contact 17 0 with ground layers 16 0 between the electromechanical lay- ers in the figure. The electromechanical layers m the figure are drawn as a transparent volume for the sake of clarity, even though the electromechanical material in reality not be¬ ing transparent. The whole piece shown in the enlarged pic¬ ture, including the electrodes, contacting etc. are integral parts of the entire monolithic module. With the above described configuration of the active elements 2, each active element 2 can be forced to move three inde¬ pendent directions. By applying the same voltage to all elec- trodes 17 I - 17 VI, the entire active element 2 elongates its height, i.e., the contact point against the body to be moved is moved upwards. By, for instance, applying a voltage to the electrodes 17 I and 17 II, the corresponding portion of the electromechanical material will try to elongate m height, wnile the otner portions are unchanged. In the Figure, this situation will result a tilting of the active element 2 in¬ wards, thus moving the contact point inwards and somewhat up¬ wards. Similarly, by applying a voltage to the electrodes 17 II - 17 IV, the active element 2 is forced to bend to the left side m Figure 1. By combining such movements, the contact point of the active element 2 can be forced to move an ar¬ bitrary direction, with certain limits. Thus, the use of electrode arrangements such as illustrated in Fig. 1 allows the element top surface to move arbitrarily m space relative to the substrate. If there are at least two in¬ dependent sets of active element, arranged for mstance as A and B in Fig. 1, then the module can easily be used with an non-resonance step technique type of motor. One example of such a motion is a rotational one. Assume a body to be moved is placed on top of the active elements 2, having one contact point for each element 2 when not active. The stepping cycle starts with elongating the active elements of set A, whereby only the three contact points with A ele¬ ments remain. Then the set A elements are activated m such a way that they all are bent in parallel to the closest edge of the hexagonal passive part 1. The moving body will then rotate a small angle around an axis going through the center of the module. The set B elements are put m contact with the moving body and the set A is contracted and straightened. The cycle then continues by bending the B set, and so on. A linear motion may also be accomplished by instead bending the sets of elements m a certain direction. It is easily un¬ derstood that any arbitrary motion withm the plane of the ac ¬ tive elements may be acheived m this way. In the above examples, the elements are assumed to be driven by constant voltage pulses, but typically in reality all ele ¬ ments are driven with sinusoidal voltages to achieve an ellip¬ tical motion of the element contact point relative to the sub¬ strate. The two sets A and B are then typically rotating about 180 degrees out of phase. For each element there are at least two phases and a simple arrangement m Fig. 1 would be to drive electrodes I and VI with one sinusoidal wave and III and IV with another. These should be phase shifted about 90 de ¬ grees to obtain a suitable elliptical motion of the contact point. There are of course numerous ways to arrange the elec- trodes in the active elements and to apply voltages to the contacts in order to achieve a motion according to the non- resonance step technique. The actual electronics may be constructed accordmg to conven- tional methods and will not be further discussed in this ap¬ plication. It is also desirable to integrate the control electronics gen¬ erating the phase shifted voltages as well as various sensor (e.g. force and position) feed-back and communication elec¬ tronics mto the integrated module or attached thereto. In such a way a specially taylored electromechanical actuator module may be available as one monolithicpiece. The actuator according to an embodiment of the present inven¬ tion is advantageously used for medical instruments of cathe¬ ter type. Assuming that control and communication electronics are integrated withm (or mounted on) the module, an arrange¬ ment such as shown, e.g., in Fig. 2 solves previous problems. The arrangement comprises a number of modules accord g to the present invention, where the whole module 1 has a wedge shape, typically with the back side 3 tilted. The wedge shape could be either the module itself or a separate unit, free or mounted on the module. It is also convenient to use an elastic material or an elastic structure (e.g. spring type of geome¬ try) in-between or as the wedge shaped unit. A " number of dif erent movement modes are easily obtainable by such an arrangement. If the modules are rotated relative to each other, a tilting action of the total arrangement results. This means that a rotational movement of one of the modules will convey the above arranged modules along circular paths, the radius of which in relation to the distance to the rotat¬ ing module will correspond to the wedge angle. A clarifying example is the case where the arrangement above the rotating module is linear. In such a case the upper part of the ar¬ rangement will follow the surface of a cone. Two modules operatmg together can create rotation without tilting. This is obtained by arranging the two wedges m opo- site directions, so that the wedge angles compensate each other. In such a way a rotational movement may be transferred further in the arrangement of Fig. 2. One possible solution for assembly of such a system would be to enclose the modules including the wedges mto a bellow- shaped tube 4. The tube is creating the normal force in- between the many modules. At the same time it serves as a pro¬ tective envelope and electrical connection. All modules could be connected to a serial communication bus (e.g. 2-4 electrical wires) to reduce the number of electrical connections between the modules. Another elegant catheter design is to use modules with a spherical contact surface, as illustrated m Fig. 3. The spherical contact surface 5 makes it possible to rotate each module relative to the next without any tilting. It is also possible to tilt each individual module m any direction if three-axial active elements are used. This corresponds to the linear motion described m connection with Fig. 1. The cathe ¬ ter will be more flexible m comparison to the previous de¬ sign, Fig. Δ . However, the wedge shaped design is much easier to manufacture, which might be an advantage in some applica- tions. There is also a desire to transport for mstance liquids and out through the catheter working end. This could be achieved with a tube 6 m the centre of the modules, Fig. 3. A peristaltic type of liquid transport may be obtained if two tube constrictions 7, separated by a certain distance, are moving together. Constrictions can be made by tube rotation or stretching using the modules. By moving the individual modules according to a certain scheme it is possible to move such con- strictions along the arrangement, and if both constrictions are moved together, the volume enclosed m-between, will be brought through the center of the arrangement. Among the high performance applications are, e.g., linear rtio- tion m fast, high precision equipment. One such design is shown in Fig. 4. It consists of three modules assembled mto a stator structure 8. The stator structure has a geometry that creates a radial force against the rotor 10 by spring type elements 9. If the active elements in the module are made for three-axial motion as indicated in the figure, then both axial motion and rotation of the rotor can be achieved. As seen in the enlarged module, the four active elements are divided mto two sets. This is also done for the two other modules of the motor. These two sets of active elements forms gripping claws m analogy with the non-resonance step principle motion, in analogy with the description of Fig. 1. If the active elements in each set are bent in a tangential direction durmg opera¬ tion, the resulting motion of the rotor will be a rotation. If the active elements m each set are bent m an axial direction during operation, the resulting motion of the rotor will be a axial translation. Of course, these two motion modes may be combined simultaneously, by letting the active elements in the modules bend in a direction between the two pure motion cases. A simple rotating motor can be constructed in an analogous way using two spring loaded structures similar to those of Fig. 1 with a rotor the middle. In the simplest version the con¬ tact points ot two monolithic modules are pressed with a clamping spring structure against either side of a planar ro¬ tor disc. If a hole is, e.g., drilled through the monolithic module, the rotor shaft connected to the rotor disc could go orthogonally to the module the centre. A body to be moved by the module is actually moved by a fric¬ tion type of force. To acheive such a force, some kind of nor¬ mal force towards the module is necessary. The normal force necessary to create motion m between the stator and rotor, i.e between a module and the body to be moved m relation to the module, can be acheived in many ways. All types of forces can be used: gravitation, magnetic, electrostatic, molecular, atomic, viscous forces. The elastic forces in springs are of course attractive for many applications but the use of perma¬ nent magnets might be one of the most cost-efficient methods. By elastic springs are understood all mechanical arrangements which presses the moving body against the modules . These "springs" normally constitute the surrounding encompassing ma¬ terial. They may, however, reqiure some amount of mountmg el- fort, which may make such solutions less cost efficient. The motion range of each active element in the modules is an extremely important parameter. A large enough motion range m relation to the fabrication precision and accuracy is needed. While the element construction given in Fig. 1 might be suffi- cient for certain motor sizes, some stroke magnification mechanism must be used when the motor is further miniaturised. In devices according to the state of the art some stroke mag¬ nification efforts are done, however, quite insufficient. The leverage structure 11 schematically presented in Fig. 5 solves all these problems. It is a monolithic body consisting of arch-shaped structures arranged with two oppositely oriented arches 12 as a base unit. The arches are typically of electro ¬ active material with layers of electrodes and connected m such a way that, for a given applied voltage, one arch in ¬ creases its curvature and the other arch decreases its curva¬ ture. In that way the entire body will expand in the vertical direction and horizontal forces 14 will be compensated for. The horizontal forces are, e.g., due to horizontal shape changes to accomplish the change of curvature. Since one arch decreases its curvature and the other increases its curvature, the resulting forces will have opposite signs m the horizon¬ tal direction, and hence are compensated withm each base unit. By intelligent distribution of the electrodes in the module three axial motion is acheived. For mstance, the elec¬ trode areas m each arch could be divided m analogy with the active elements 2 m the monolithic module 1 and hence the central portion which is used for the transfer of force and displacement will be possible to move also a horizontal di- rection. The volume in between the arches is either empty or filled with suitable elastic material. An elastic material such as a rubber will serve e.g. as a protection against over¬ loading witnout a substantial loss of actuator performance. According to the present invention a method of fabrication ot monolithic modules is disclosed. In this method there is of course a desire to directly form the monolithic module to its final shape, including internal voids or similar. In Figs. 6- 9, some possible processing techniques to solve these problems are described. In Fig. 6 rollers 18 with geometrical shapes 19 are used for replication of these shapes mto a tape of elec¬ tro-mechanical material 15. An alternative to rollers is the use of the somewhat slower stamping process, wnich has the ac- vantage of a cheaper tool fabrication. The shapes fabricated by the replication process are principally used for definition of electrode layers and connections between layers m the green state, i.e., before heat treatment. Other uses of the replication technique is as an aid for dlignment, and to de ¬ fine void volumes, which is further described below. Depending on the actual application, the tape may be covered with electrode layers 16 as shown m Fig. 7, prior to the above described replication. If the tape is covered with elec ¬ trode layers 16, either on one or on both sides, the pattern- mg of the electrodes can then be made directly by the rolling process, Fig. /. The electrode layer is divided by plastic de¬ formation of the tape resulting in separate electrode areas, as can be seen in Fig. 1. The electrode patterning on top of, e.g., a polymer tape with piezoelectric grains is normally difficult by means of standard litographic techniques accord¬ mg to the state of the art, and the method according to the present invention solves this problem m an elegant way. Electrical connection between the layers can also be made by forming holes 20 by plastic deformation of the tape. In Fig. 7, the walls of the hole 20 are still covered with electrode material and an electric connection is formed between the two layers. Alternatively, a hole formed in the above described way may be filled with electrically conducting paste. In this way electrical connections may be produced not only horizon¬ tally, but also vertically through the modules. Another method for formation of electrical connections would be to use roll ¬ ing, see Fig. 8, folding, twisting etc. m combination with plastic deformation to achieve the desired electrical connec- tion. in the manufacture of actuators based on electromechani¬ cal materials, one of the time consuming and overall limiting processing steps is the electrical connection between the lay¬ ers. Simple folding, where two different parallel layers are connected in the fold itself, solves this problem in certain applications since there will be no need for connections mbe- tween the layers. Rolling and twisting of the polymer tape with electroactive material are other methods for formation of electrical connections inbetween different layers without forming holes. Subsequent processing steps are to laminate these layers and by heat treatment produce a monolithic unit or module, methods known per se. These steps are therefore not further discussed this disclosure. Internal void volumes (or suitable materials) could be made by including layers with non-electroactive material. Such layers may be introduced before or after the replication step as well as durmg the laminating step. By the replication, polymer volumes of different geometries are created. Durmg heat- treatment, in particular the conventional mtroductional burn¬ out heat treament, a polymer material would disappear, for in¬ stance. A void volume is thus possible to create by introduc¬ ing a patterned polymer layer with aid of the replication technique. External friction layers, suitable at the top of the active elements ot the module, etc. could bo mcluded in the same manner. Since the outer parts of the active elements are tne portions of the modules which are in mechanical contact with the moving body, these are the only parts of the modules, which are exposed to tribological effects. However, since the moving action is dependent on a certain friction, there has to be some sort of contact. One way to improve the resistance to wear etc. could then be to cover the outermost parts of the active elements with external friction layers. Such layers are also easily introduced the fabrication method according to tne present invention, by adding one or several layers of wear resistant material on top of the final electromechanical lay- ers. The friction layers are subsequently integrated into the module durmg the sintering process. One difficult step m the manufacturing process is the align- ment of the different lamination layers prior to the heat treatments. Since the allover accuracy has to be in the order of μm, a corresponding accuracy has to be obtained during the alignment process. Alignment durmg lamination can be greatly simplified if particular alignment geometries 21, e.g. peg in hole, also are replicated in the film. From figure 9, it is seen that geometrical structures can assist m the alignment procedure. In Figure 9, certain geometrical edges on three layers in series are denoted by 21A - 21F. Protruding edges, 21A, 21B and 21 E, correspond to recess edges, 21C, 21D and 21F, respectively, m the underlying layer. When positioning such layers on top of each other, these edges will fit to¬ gether and guide the layers to be accurately aligned. Although certain preferred embodiments of the mvention have been presented m the above description, it should be noted that the invention is not limited thereto. It is understood that variations and modifications according to the spirit of the invention should be mcluded and the invention is solely defined by the scope of the appended claims.

Claims: CLAIMS 1. An actuator or motor comprising electromechanical mate¬ rial which alters its shape under the influence of an electric field, whereby motion relative a body is created by non- resonant repetition of small steps, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n h a t said actuator or motor comprises at least one monolithic module with electrodes integrated in said electro¬ mechanical material, said monolithic module having at least one passive part (1) and at least one active element (2), whereby at least two independent contact points at said at least one active element (2) are provided against said body, which contact points are positionable independently of each other in at least two independent directions relative to said passive part (1) of said monolithic module, whereby said mono¬ lithic module by itself or m combination with others is used for creating said motion. 2. An actuator or motor according to claim 1, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said contact points are located at different active elements (2) . 3. An actuator or motor according to claim 1, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said contact points are positionable independently of each other, relative to said passive part (1) of the monolithic module, three independ¬ ent directions. 4. An actuator or motor according to claim 1, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said contact points of the monolithic modules are located a plane being in¬ clined relative to a base plane of said monolithic module or an attached unit. 5. An actuator or motor according to claim 4, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said body has a wedge shape . 6. An actuator or motor according to claim 5, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said body comprises an elastic material. 7. An actuator or motor according to claim 5, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said body is an elas ¬ tic structure. 8. An actuator or motor according to claim 1, c h a r a c t e r i z e d b y a spherical contact geometry of said monolithic modules. 9. An actuator or motor according to any of the claim 4 to 8, c h a r a c t e r i z e d b y a bellow-shaped tube, used to create a normal force between said monolithic modules. 10. An actuator or motor according to claim 1, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said monolithic mod ¬ ules are pressed against said body. 11. An actuator or motor according to claim 10, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said monolithic mod¬ ules are pressed against said body by gravitational, electro¬ static, molecular, atomic or viscous forces. 12. An actuator or motor according to claim 10, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said monolithic mod¬ ules are pressed against said body by magnetic forces. 13. An actuator or motor according to claim 10, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said monolithic mod ¬ ules are pressed against said body by elastic spring forces. 14. An actuator system comprising a number of monolithic modules according to claim 1. 15. An actuator system according to claim 14, c h a r a c t e r i z e d b y a bellow-shaped tube (4) , used to create a normal force between said monolithic modules. 16. An actuator system accordmg to claim 14, c h a r a c t e r i z e d b y a central tube (6) , used for transport of liquids or the like. 17. An actuator system comprising at least two monolithic modules according to claim 1, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t active elements on said modules are used for at least two axial motion of said body (10) . 18. An actuator or motor according to claim 1, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t three dimensional cavities are integrated m said monolithic modules, to create an internal leverage, and the cavities are either empty or filled with an adequate material. 19. An actuator or motor according to claim 18, c h a r a c t e r i z e d b y a base unit of said monolitnic module, consisting of structures (12) which are curved m two or m three dimensions. 20. An actuator or motor according to claim 18, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said internal lever¬ age is based on arch-shaped structures (12) which are fixed at least at two ends, whereby force and displacement transfer is located substantially at the central portion of said arch- shaped structure (12) . 21. An actuator or motor according to claim 19, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said internal lever¬ age is obtained by using curved membranes or plate structures. 22. An actuator or motor according to claim 18, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said cavities are filled with rubber-like material. 23. An actuator or motor according to any of the preceeding claims; c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said mono- lithic module also comprises control electronics generating phase shifted voltages and various feed-back and communication electronics of a sensor, said sensor measuring e.g. force and position. 24. Method of driving an actuator or motor comprising elec¬ tromechanical material altering its shape under the influence of an electric field, comprising the step of moving said ac ¬ tuator or motor by repeating small steps, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said step of moving comprises the further step of driving at least one monolithic module by itself or m combination with other monolithic mod¬ ules, said monolithic module having electrodes integrated in said electromechanical material, havmg at least two independ¬ ent contact points being positionable independently of each other in at least two independent directions relative to a passive part of said monolithic module. 25. Method of driving an actuator or motor according to claim 24, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said driv- mg of at least one monolithic module transfers a rotating mo ¬ tion mto a tilting motion. 26. Method of driving an actuator or motor according to claim 24, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said step of moving of at least two monolithic modules further comprises a step of transporting liquids m a central tube. 27. Method of driving an actuator or motor according to claim 26, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said step of transporting is acheived by a peristaltic motion due to moving constrictions (7) controlled by said monolithic mod¬ ules . 28. A method for fabrication of an actuator or motor com¬ prising electromechanical material altering its shape under the influence of an electric field, comprising the step of creating complex electrode arrangements in said electrome¬ chanical material c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said method comprises replication of geometrical shapes into a green body of said electromechanical material. 29. A method for fabrication according to claim 28, c h a r a c t e r i z e d b y the step of coating said elec- tromechanic material with an electrode layer prior to said step of replication. 30. A method for fabrication according to claim 28, c h a r a c t e r i z e d b y a step of replication of a geometrical shape into said green body, wherem said geometri¬ cal shapes are used for alignment of one green body with an¬ other. 31. A method for fabrication according to claim 28, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said step of replica¬ tion results m formation of holes in said green body for electrode connections between layers. 32. A method for fabrication according to claim 28, c h a r a c t e r i z e d b y a step of accomplishing con¬ nection of electrode layers with plastic deformation proc¬ esses . 33. A method for fabrication according to claim 28, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said step of replica¬ tion mcludes forming of layers with non-electroactive materi¬ als. 34. A method for fabrication according to claim 28, c h a r a c t e r i z e d b y a step of forming external friction layers. 35. A method for fabrication according to claim 28, c h a r a c t e r i z e d i n t h a t said step of replica¬ tion mcludes the step of forming void volumes.

Inventors: BEXELL MATS, JOHANSSON STEFAN, BEXELL, MATS, JOHANSSON, STEFAN
Applicants: BEXELL MATS, JOHANSSON STEFAN, PIEZOMOTORS UPPSALA AB, BEXELL, MATS, JOHANSSON, STEFAN
Application year: 1997
Main classification: H02N2
IPC codes: H01L41, H02N2