Development of a novel two-DOF pointing mechanism using a bending-bending hybrid piezoelectric actuator

A novel two-DOF pointing mechanism using a bending-bending hybrid piezoelectric actuator was proposed. The pointing mechanism realized rotary motions around two orthogonal axes by single actuator based on the inertial driving principle. The pointing mechanism was designed and its operating principles were described in detail. The theoretical analyses were performed to design the piezoelectric actuator. The piezoelectric actuator was fabricated and a prototype of the pointing mechanism was assembled. The measured results indicated that the maximum rotary velocities of the rotor were 0.153 rad/s around X-axis and 0.154 rad/s around Y-axis under the voltage of 400 V_p-p and frequency of 460 Hz, respectively. Moreover, the angular displacement resolutions achieved 2.49 μrad around X-axis and 2.52 μrad around Y-axis under a voltage increment of 3 V. The two-DOF pointing mechanism could be applied to precision pointing and attitude adjustment systems as its merits of high speed, high resolution, and large motion space.