Monitoring and meaning of vibrations in robot polishing

Robot polishing is increasingly used in the production of high-end glass work pieces such as astronomy mirrors, lithography lenses, laser gyroscopes or high-precision coordinate measuring machines. The quality of optical components such as lenses or mirrors can be described by shape errors and surface roughness. Whilst the trend towards sub nanometre level surfaces finishes and features progresses, matching both form and finish coherently in complex parts remains a major challenge. With larger or more precise optics, the influence of process instabilities on the quality of the optics to be polished has a greater impact. Vibrations at a polishing head have a negative influence on the polishing result. These vibrations are caused by bearing damage, motors and other excitations (e.g. gears, belts). The aim of this work is the determination of vibrations at a polishing head and their avoidance strategies. Different bearing conditions are considered: new and perfect bearing, a bearing that has been in contact with polish (rust) and a bearing with repeatable damage (groove milled on the running surface). It can be shown that the frequencies of bearings affect the polishing tool. Furthermore, reasons for and against vibrations in the process are discussed. For the case of vibrationless machining, avoidance strategies were presented.