Automatic dextrous microhandling based on a 6-DOF microgripper

The demand for automatic quality inspection of individual micro-components has increased strongly in the micro-optoelectronics industry. In many cases, quality inspection of those micro-components needs dexterous microhandling. However, automatic dexterous handling of microcomponents is a very challenging issue which is barely explored. This paper presents a high-DOF (degrees of freedom) automatic dexterous handling and inspection system for micro-optoelectronic components using a novel 6-DOF piezoelectric microgripper. The control system includes three hierarchical layers: an actuator control layer, a motion planning layer and a mission control layer. Machine vision is applied in automatic manipulation. The performance of the system is demonstrated in a vision-based automatic inspection task for 300 × 300 × 100- μ m-sized optoelectronics components and reached a cycle time of 7.1 ± 0.3 s.