Design, Analysis, and Testing of a Novel 5-DOF Flexure-Based Alignment Stage

Abstract

A high pattern resolution is critical for fabricating roll-to-roll printed electronics (R2RPE) products. For enhanced overlay alignment accuracy, position errors between the printer and the substrate web must be eliminated, particularly in inkjet printing applications. This paper proposes a novel five-degree-of-freedom (5-DOF) flexure-based alignment stage to adjust the posture of an inkjet printer head. The stage effectively compensates for positioning errors between the actuation mechanism and manipulated objects through a series–parallel combination of compliant substructures. Voice coil motors (VCMs) and linear motors serve as actuators to achieve the required motion. Theoretical models were established using a pseudo-rigid-body model (PRBM) methodology and were validated through finite element analysis (FEA). Finally, an alignment stage prototype was fabricated for an experiment. The prototype test results showed that the developed positioning platform attains 5-DOF motion capabilities with 335.1 µm × 418.9 µm × 408.1 µm × 3.4 mrad × 3.29 mrad, with cross-axis coupling errors below 0.11% along y- and z-axes. This paper proposes a novel 5-DOF flexure-based alignment stage that can be used for error compensation in R2RPE and effectively improves the interlayer alignment accuracy of multi-layer printing.