Air Bearing Stages Selection Guide

Aerotech air-bearing positioning tables incorporate over three decades of knowledge we've gained in designing high precision motion control and positioning systems. Driven by our brushless linear servomotors, Aerotech air-bearing positioning stages are ideal for semiconductor equipment, fiberoptics, photonics, and other critical industrial automation applications. Our air-bearing positioning tables incorporate an active preload on both vertical and horizontal surfaces. Opposing thin-film pressure maintains the bearing nominal gap tolerance. This design, in addition to the large air-bearing surface that distributes the load over a large surface area, results in outstanding stiffness that is ideal for heavy or offset loading. Proprietary manufacturing techniques result in an air-bearing positioning stage with unsurpassed geometrical characteristics. The air bearing has an inherent averaging effect that maximizes performance. The thin film will fill small surface voids and other irregularities, yielding superior pitch, roll, yaw, and straightness and flatness specifications for these positioning tables.

Note: Click HERE to view the ABF series air-bearing filtration unit that cleans and conditions compressed air used to supply air-bearing mechanics.

Linear Air-Bearing Stages

Rotary Air-Bearing Stages

Linear Air-Bearing Stages

ABL1000 Air Bearing Stage

ABL1500 Air Bearing Stage

ABL1500-B Air Bearing Stage

The ABL 1000 series stages are the highest performance miniature air-bearing stages available. Aerotech has combined over 30 years of precision motion control and positioning system experience with the latest technologies to produce a truly outstanding miniature, linear air-bearing stage.

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Leading-edge manufacturing, particularly in the semiconductor and data storage industries, demands positioning tolerances beyond the capability of conventional ball-screw and mechanical-bearing positioning systems. The ABL1500, with its fully active preload, exceptionally high stiffness and excellent geometric characteristics, was designed specifically to meet those demands.

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The ABL1500-B continues the exceptional performance of the ABL1500, but uses an integral bellows system to provide a high level of environmental protection. This system protects the air bearings and drive system from process-generated contamination like abrasive debris.

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Travel	≤150 mm
Accuracy	±0.20 µm
Repeatability	±0.05 µm
Straightness	±0.25 µm
Flatness	±0.25 µm

Travel	≤500 mm
Accuracy	±0.2 µm
Repeatability	±0.1 µm
Straightness	±0.25 µm
Flatness	±0.25 µm

Travel	≤500 mm
Accuracy	±0.3 µm
Repeatability	±0.15 µm
Straightness	±0.25 µm
Flatness	±0.25 µm

ABL1500WB Air Bearing Stage

ABL1500WB-B Air Bearing Stage

The ABL1500WB is a wide-base version of the ABL1500 series air-bearing stage. The wider base makes the ABL1500WB ideally suited for applications with large offset loads, and it is ideal as the lower axis in XY stage systems with large travel. The ABL1500WB incorporates dual linear motors, effectively doubling the force output of a standard ABL1500 stage.

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The ABL1500WB-B is a wide-base, environmentally protected version of the ABL1500 series air-bearing stage. The wider base makes the ABL1500WB-B ideally suited for applications with large offset loads, and it is ideal as the lower axis in XY stage systems with large travel. The ABL1500WB-B incorporates dual linear motors, effectively doubling the force output of a standard ABL1500 stage.

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Travel	≤500 mm
Accuracy	±0.4 µm
Repeatability	±0.1 µm
Straightness	±0.5 µm
Flatness	±0.5 µm

Travel	≤500 mm
Accuracy	±0.5 µm
Repeatability	±0.25 µm
Straightness	±0.5 µm
Flatness	±0.5 µm

ABL2000 Air Bearing Stage

ABL3600 Air Bearing Stage

ABL8000 Air Bearing Stage

The ABL 2000 combines excellent pitch/yaw characteristics with unsurpassed velocity control that is necessary for wafer imaging, defect detection and coating applications.

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The ABL3600 dual-axis, large aperture, open-frame, airbearing stage addresses the unique needs of scanning microscopy and mask and wafer inspection.

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The ABL8000 incorporates a modified cross section design that dramatically increases stiffness and stability. This is useful for large payloads whose C.G.’s are off of the carriage centerline.

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Travel	≤1200 mm
Accuracy	±0.50 µm
Repeatability	±0.20 µm
Straightness	±0.25 µm
Flatness	±0.25 µm

Travel	≤250 mm
Accuracy	±1 µm
Repeatability	±0.2 µm
Straightness	±0.5 µm
Flatness	±1 µm

Travel	≤1000 mm
Accuracy	±0.50 µm
Repeatability	±0.20 µm
Straightness	±0.40µm
Flatness	±0.40µm

ABL9000 Air Bearing Stage

AHL9000 Linear Motor Stage

ABG10000 Air Bearing Gantry

The ABL9000 is simply the world’s highest performance air bearing. Designed to meet the exacting requirements of wafer, flat panel display, and optical inspection and fabrication, the ABL9000 sets new standards of performance.

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The AHL9000 linear motor stage combines air bearings for the scan axis and mechanical bearings for the step axis, and has been designed for demanding applications that require excellent step and scan performance.

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The ABG10000 Air Bearing Gantry puts Aerotech’s core technologies and extensive manufacturing capability to work for you, providing outstanding performance and versatility in a wide range of automation applications.

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Travel	≤1200 mm
Accuracy	±0.5 µm
Repeatability	±0.1 µm
Straightness	±0.50µm
Flatness	±0.50µm

Travel	≤350 mm
Accuracy	± 1.0 µm
Repeatability	±0.2 µm
Straightness	±0.6 µm
Flatness	±0.6 µm

Travel	≤1000 mm
Accuracy	± 2 µm
Repeatability	±0.5 µm
Straightness	±1 µm
Flatness	±1 µm

Planar_HD Air Bearing Stage

The Planar_HD air-bearing stage has been designed specifically to maximize throughput by providing up to 2 m/s scan velocity and 5 g acceleration. The design utilizes a highly engineered mechanical structure that increases air-bearing stiffness and decreases moving mass. In addition, the locations of the center of force and the center of mass have been optimized to eliminate parasitic forces that can result in throughput reducing error motions.

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Travel	500 mm
Accuracy	±300 nm
Repeatability	±50 nm
Resolution	0.25 nm

Rotary Air-Bearing Stages

ABRS Rotary Air Bearing Stage

ABRT Rotary Air Bearing Stage

ARA1000 Air-Bearing Rotary Actuator

Aerotech’s ABRS series rotary air-bearing stages provide superior angular positioning, velocity stability, and error motion performance in an exceptionally low-profile package.

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Aerotech's ABRT series rotary air-bearing stages provide superior angular positioning, velocity stability, and error motion performance along with impressive payload capacity and outstanding radial and axial stiffness.

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The ARA1000 rotary actuator was designed for applications requiring articulation for large payloads. It eliminates the mechanical instability of high load inertia, multi-axis systems through a proprietary design that significantly increases stage stiffness.

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Tabletop Diameter	128.1-278.1 mm
Resolution	0.18-0.036 arc sec
Bidirectional Repeatability	<1 arc sec

Tabletop Diameter	100-200 mm
Resolution	0.055-0.027 arc sec
Bidirectional Repeatability	<1 arc sec

Diameter	342.9 mm
Accuracy	±2 arc sec
Load	45 kg