Study of a 3D-printed Monolithic Compliant Tip-tilt-z Stage for Micro-alignment

Abstract

Tip-tilt-z micro-positioning is crucial in wafer alignment. Due to the restrain of traditional manufacturing technique, it is hard to development compliant tip-tilt-z (CTTZ) mechanism in the form of single-piece monolithic structure. This paper presents the design, fabrication, and experimental tests of a CTTZ stage with monolithic spatial structure based on additive manufacturing (3D printing). The results verified the feasibility of developing complex compliant mechanism with spatial, compact, and monolithic structure, which could realize precision capability up to submicron and micro-radian using easy-access 3D-printing.