Dual drive system modeling and analysis for synchronous control of an H-type gantry

In this paper, the dynamics and synchronous control issues of dual drive system for gantry stages will be addressed. A physical dynamics model considering the mechanical coupling structure is presented. By carefully studying the dynamics we also try to find the main factors that cause interaction between different axes. Identification experiments are carried out in frequency domain to validate the proposed model, and to reveal the presence of high frequency resonance modes caused by the guide bearings and the rotation of the crossbeam. Synchronous control scheme with cross-coupled compensation are applied to achieve good synchronization between the two motors. Experiments are carried out on a base of an H-type gantry stage. The results verify the analysis, and provide a guideline for future research on synchronous control of this system when making trade-off between maximizing the achievable control performance and not exciting high-order dynamics in practice.