Disturbance observer and feedforward design for a high-speed direct-drive positioning table

Design and implementation of a discrete-time tracking controller for a precision positioning table actuated by direct-drive motors is considered. The table has acceleration capabilities in excess of 5 G, positioning accuracy at the micron level, and is used in applications such as semiconductor packaging. The controller proposed uses a disturbance observer and proportional derivative (PD) compensation in the feedback path and a zero phase error tracking controller and zero phase low-pass filter in the feedforward path. The existing disturbance observer design techniques are extended to account for time delay in the plant. Practical difficulties with excessive feedforward gains are examined and a low-order filter design method is proposed. Experimental results for quantized low-order position reference trajectories, which are commonly used in industrial systems, demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach