Control of voltage signal for piezoelectric actuator towards micro manipulation

Piezoelectric actuator can be used for handling and grasping of micro scale objects in micro manipulation or robotic assembly where study of stable displacement and force characteristics with voltage signal are important. In order to obtain these behaviors using voltage signal, electromechanical characterization of piezo actuator has been carried out in this paper. A mathematical model for deflection and force response of piezo actuator with voltage is derived with the help of a simple first-order model under a step input voltage. This is controlled through proportional-derivative (PD) controller. Through experiments, it is verified that the piezo actuator attains the maximum deflection upto 1.5 mm and produces force upto 0.203 N for a voltage range of 0-60V. By controlling the voltage of piezo actuator for micro manipulation, a piezo actuator based micro gripper is developed.