A CONTACT POSITION DETECTION AND INTERACTION FORCE MONITORING SENSOR FOR MICRO-ASSEMBLY APPLICATIONS
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A CONTACT POSITION DETECTION AND INTERACTION FORCE MONITORING SENSOR FORMICRO-ASSEMBLY APPLICATIONSJ. Wei1*, M. Porta2, M. Tichem2, P.M. Sarro1Delft Institute of Microsystems and Nanoelectronics (DIMES)1Laboratory of Electronic Components, Technology and Materials (ECTM),2Department of Precision and Microsystems Engineering (PME),Delft University of Technology, Delft, THE NETHERLANDSABSTRACTThis paper presents a piezoresistive sensor for micro-assembly application, which is capable of detecting the contact position of the micro-object on the grasping surface as well as the grasping force. By comparing the outputs of a local 2D force sensor and a global force sensor, the 2D contact position on the grasping surface and the contact force can be extracted. The device is fabricated with an IC-compatible process and can be integrated into micro-grippers. The measurement results show that different contact positions can be distinguished. The device is suitable to detect a contact force up to 4 mN, with a sensitivity of 16.4 V/N. The estimated force resolution is 1 μN.KEYWORDSMicro-assembly, Grasping force measurement, Contact position measurementINTRODUCTIONMicro-grippers have a paramount importance in the controlled micro-assembly of fragile and delicate hybrid micro-products. In order to improve the execution of micro-assembly operations, i.e. micrometer-accuracy operations on sub-mm sized parts, it is essential to monitor the grasping condition during the manipulation of the objects. Different kinds of force sensors [1-4] have been integrated into micro-grippers. However, currently available devices can usually detect only the 1D grasping force on the object (the force perpendicular to the contact surface) and, sometimes, an interaction force along one direction.To ensure a reliable and efficient micro-manipulation, such as releasing an object in the correct location and peg-in-hole task, it is essential to know whether the object is properly clamped (Fig.1.I), and whether and how the gripped object touches other objects (Fig.1.II). To do this, the contact location on the grasping surface of the gripper and the interaction forces in 3D need to be detected.Currently, the detection of the contact position is done by vision. However, quite often the view is obstructed or limited by obstacles and other parts to be assembled, and thus the control of the micro-object location is no longer possible. Then, it is important to give also the micro-gripper itself the capability to monitor the contact location of the micro-object. Actually, the knowledge of the object location on the grasping surface has a paramount importance for successfully performing the further assembly tasks after the grasping of the object.Figure 1: Typical tasks in micro-assembly: I) Pick and place: a) the object is not correctly grasped; b) the object is correctly grasped; II) peg in hole task: the contact with other object can be detected by monitoring the interaction force.In this paper, we develop and test a new sensor which is capable of detecting the contact position of the micro-object on the grasping surface as well as the perpendicular force acting on this surface. The basic principle, fabrication process and experimental validation of the device are illustrated and discussed in the following sections.CONCEPT & DESIGNIn order to give the micro-gripper the capability of detecting simultaneously the contact position and the perpendicular force acting on the grasping surface, the device shown in Fig.2 is proposed. This device can be integrated in the fingers of micro-grippers by using the IC-compatible process reported in [2].The structure of the device consists of an L-shape beam and a deep vertical contact plate (grasping surface). Piezoresistors pairs for local force sensor (R L1, R L2) and global force sensor (R G1, R G2), are placed on the beam.Th3E.001Figure 2: Schematic drawing of the proposed device with the main components and geometrical parameters shown.The global force sensor detects the contact force F in the z direction. The local force sensor, which employs a 2D force sensing principle [5] with a reconfigurable Wheatstone bridge, detects the local interaction by monitoring the moments (M x , M y ) in the other two degreesof freedom (x and y axis) as shown in Fig.3.Figure 3: Detection of the local interaction on the contact plate: by changing the connection in the Wheatstone bridge, it is possible to switch between horizontal and vertical sensing.Assuming a perpendicular force on the contact plate, the stresses induced in the global piezoresistors by the moment M G is shown in (1), where I 1y is the moment of inertia of the beam 1 about the y axis, and E is the Young’s modulus of the material.yy G M G I E w x L F I E w M G11111)(2/)(2/⋅⋅+⋅=⋅⋅=σ(1)The stress in the local piezoresistors induced by themoments M x and M y are shown in equations (2) and (3), where I 2y and I 2x are the moments of inertia of the beam 2 about y and x, respectively.yy x Mx L I E w x F I E w M 2222)(2/2/⋅⋅⋅=⋅⋅=σ (2)xxy My L I E t y F I E t M 22)(2/2/⋅⋅⋅=⋅⋅=σ(3)By combining equations (1) and (2), it is possible to extract the x position and then the force F acting on the plate, while the combination between (2) and (3) allows the detection of the y position (4-6).yMx L yM G I w I w x L G 21)(12)(11⋅⋅⋅⋅=+σσ (4)y Mx L x My L I t I w x y 2)(22)(⋅⋅⋅⋅=σσ (5)()x L w I F yM G G+⋅⋅=111)(2/σ (6)As shown in equations (4) and (5) the computation of the contact location is independent from the force F . The stresses σ in the piezoresistors can be computed by monitoring the variation of their resistance as shown in equation (7) [6].()()11124412x l l l x ρπσπππσρΔ=⋅=++⋅ (7) where ρ is the zero stress resistivity, Δρ is the resistivity change, x is a general point in the piezoresistor, σl is the longitudinal stress, and πl is the longitudinal piezoresistive coefficient (π11=1.8E-11 Pa -1, π12= 2.5E-11 Pa -1 and π44=118.4E-11 Pa -1) [5].The geometrical dimensions of the structure are optimized considering the trade-off between resolution and maximum force. The piezoresistance output is proportional to the stress variation. Therefore, a larger stress concentration results in a better resolution for a fixed amount of force. However, since the maximum stress is limited by the yield stress of the material, a better resolution leads to a smaller maximum force which can be applied onthe contact plate.The influence of the friction forces parallel to the contact plate induces extra moments on both sensors, affecting the extracted contact position. When a free object is grasped, the friction is not present, until the object experiences external forces. This effect can be used to evaluate the external forces applied on the grasped object. FABRICATIONAn IC-compatible process is used to fabricate the proposed structure. The starting material is a (100) p-type silicon wafer, with a 1 μm thick n-type epitaxy layer. The piezoresistors are created by using a second epitaxy layer (Fig.4.a), which is 500 nm thick and boron doped with a concentration of 1.1E18 atoms/cm3. A reactive ion etching (RIE) is then used to define the dimension of the piezoresistors. Both the sensing and reference resistors are oriented along the [110] direction in (001) plane. The resistors are isolated from each other by the reversed biased n-type epitaxy layer and p-type isolation rings created by ion implantation (Fig.4.b). After metallization and passivation, the wafer is ready for the micromachining process to form the sensing cantilever and the vertical sensing contact plate.The micromachining process starts with the etching of cavities on the back side of the wafer, to define both the thickness of the suspending L-shape cantilever and the height of the sensing vertical plate in one step (Fig.4.c). An anisotropic etchant, TMAH, is used, so that the height of the contact plate can be easily defined by the (111) crystal plane of silicon. A deep reactive ion etching (DRIE) is then used to define the lateral sizes of both the cantilever and the contact plate from the front side of the wafer, where a pre-deposited aluminum layer inside the cavity functions as a mechanical support and etch-stop at the same time (Fig.4.d). Finally, by removing the aluminum layer, the proposed structure is released and ready to test.Figure 4: Schematic view of the fabrication flow.RESULTS & DISCUSSIONFigure 6 shows the fabricated device. The suspending cantilever is 1 mm long, 60 μm wide and 25 μm thick. The dimensions of the vertical contact plate are 500 μm and 170 μm in horizontal and vertical direction respectively.Figure 5: SEM image of the fabricated device. The size of its main components is shown as well.To validate the proposed concept, the detection of the contact position and the contact force are investigated. Experiments are carried out on a probe-station (Fig.6), where a needle is used to push the contact plate at different positions (1 to 6 in Fig.1). The corresponding displacement of the cantilever can be monitored by observing the relative displacement between the pointer and the ruler. Hence, the applied contact force can be roughly estimated. The resistance change in both resistor pairs is monitored simultaneously with an Agilent 4156C precision semiconductor parameter analyzer. The pushing position and the force acting on the plate are then calculated with the previous equations (4-7).Figure 6: Optical image of the device in operation and detail of the ruler with the pointer, when pushed by the needle.Figure 7 shows the actual and the measured contact positions. The different contact points where the needle pushes are clearly distinguished although a shift, between the actual and the measured ones, is observed. The positionshift is due to a non-perpendicular pushing and frictionbetween needle and contact plate.Figure 7: The actual and measured contact positions of the needle.Table 2 shows the applied and the measured force acting on the plate when pushing at the six different points with an observed displacement of 5 μm on the ruler. The applied force is derived from the displacement and the measured one is obtained on the basis of the piezoresistor outputs.Table 2: Applied and computed contact force. Point Applied Force Measured ForceValue [mN] Value [mN] % error1 0.86 0.75 132 1.14 0.95 173 1.71 1.23 284 0.86 1.1 275 1.14 1.52 326 1.71 2.23 30The difference between the applied force and the measured one is, again, due to the unavoidable friction forces, which affect both the local and the global sensor outputs.Both the maximum force and the sensitivity of the force depend on the contact location. For a fixed amount of force, points 1 and 4 induces the maximum stress on the global sensor while points 3 and 6 the minimum one. Thus, points 1 and 4 allow the most limited maximum force, and point 3 and 6 have the worst sensitivity. The maximum force allowed at point 1 is 4 mN. This value is estimated by considering a maximum resistance variation of 10%, in order to maintain a linear relation between force and resistance variation. The sensitivity is then obtained at point 3. A 2.8% of sensing resistance variation is obtainedwith 1.71 mN force applied. This corresponds to a sensitivity of 16.4 V /N, when a Wheatstone bridge with 1V supply voltage is used.The estimated resolution is in the order of 1 µNconsidering thermal noise and 1/f noise in a frequency band between 0.1 Hz to 1 kHz.CONCLUSIONSA novel sensor able to detect the position and the magnitude of a perpendicular external force on the contact plate is developed and successfully tested. The device is fabricated with an IC-compatible process, and can be integrated into micro-grippers. The device is suitable to detect a contact force up to 4 mN, with a sensitivity of 16.4 V/N. The estimated force resolution is 1 µN.Future work will focus on reducing the influence of the friction force in the measurement and the integration of the device in micro-grippers.ACKNOWLEDGMENTSThe authors wish to thank the technical staff of DIMES and PME for their precious help. Particular thanks to Dr. Trinh Chu Duc for many helpful technical discussions and to Ir. Sander Paalvast for his assistance in the arrangement of the experimental setup. This work is funded by the MicroNed program.REFERENCES[1] R. Perez, N. Chaillet, K. Domanski, J. Pawel, P.Grabiec, “Fabrication, modelling and integration of a silicon technology force sensor in a piezoelectric micro-manipulator”, Sensors and Actuators. A, Physical , vol. 128, no. 2, pp. 367-375, 2006.[2] T. Chu Duc, G. K. Lau, J. F. Creemer, P. M. Sarro,“Electrothermal microgripper with large jaw displacement and integrated force sensors”, Journal of MEMS , vol. 7, no. 6, pp.1546-1555, 2008.[3] F. Beyeler, A. Neild, S.Oberti, D. J. Bell, Y. Sun, J.Dual, B. J. Nelson, “Monolithically Fabricated Microgripper with Integrated Force Sensor for Manipulating Microobjects and Biological Cells Aligned in an Ultrasonic Field”, Journal of MEMS , vol. 16, no. 1, pp. 7-15, 2007.[4] K. Deok-Ho, M. Gu Lee, K. Byungkyu, Y Sun, “Asuperelastic alloy microgripper with embedded electromagnetic actuators and piezoelectric force sensors: a numerical and experimental study”, Smart Materials and Structures , vol. 14, no. 6, pp. 1265-1272, 2005.[5] T. Chu Duc, J.F. Creemer, P.M. Sarro, “Piezoresistivecantilever beam for force sensing in two dimensions”, IEEE Sensors Journal , vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 96-104, 2007. [6] S. D. Senturia, “Microsystem design,” KluwerAcademic Publishers, 2001.CONTACT* J. Wei, tel: +31-(0)15-2781237; j.wei@tudelft.nl。