Design and control of a novel hybrid feed drive for high performance and energy efficient machining

Achieving sustainability in manufacturing requires that the energy consumption of manufacturing machines be reduced without unduly sacrificing their speed and accuracy. This paper presents the design and control of a novel feed drive whose actuation method and drive configuration change depending on the mode of the machining operation. During rapid traverse, the table is driven at its center of gravity using a linear motor. When cutting begins, the table automatically couples to a motor-driven shaft, while the linear motor provides active vibration damping and quasi-static error compensation. Improvements in speed, accuracy and/or energy efficiency over conventional drives are experimentally demonstrated.