Piezoelectric motor

The growth and forming of piezoelectric crystals is a well-developed industry, yielding very uniform and consistent distortion for a given applied potential difference.

This, combined with the minute scale of the distortions, gives the piezoelectric motor the ability to make very fine steps.

The most obvious difference is the use of resonance to amplify the vibration of the stator in contact with the rotor in ultrasonic motors.

Later designs by Sashida and researchers at Matsushita, ALPS, Xeryon and Canon made use of traveling-wave vibration to obtain bi-directional motion, and found that this arrangement offered better efficiency and less contact interface wear.

[4] The mechanism of slip-stick motors rely on the inertia in combination with the difference between static and dynamic friction.

A second drive type, the squiggle motor, uses piezoelectric elements bonded orthogonally to a nut.

For example, with a hard and rigid rotor-spindle coated with a thin layer of a softer material (like a polyurethane rubber), a series of angled piezoelectric transducers can be arranged.

The first U.S. patent to disclose a vibrationally-driven motor may be "Method and Apparatus for Delivering Vibratory Energy" (U.S. Pat.

The first practical piezomotors were designed and produced by V. Lavrinenko in Piezoelectronic Laboratory, starting 1964, Kyiv Polytechnic Institute, USSR.