The geometric error motions of rotary stages greatly affect the accuracy of constructed machines such as machine tools, measuring instruments, and robots. In this paper, an embedded sensor system for real-time measurement of two radial and three angular error motions of a rotary stage is proposed, which makes use of a rotary encoder with multiple scanning heads to measure the rotational angle and two radial error motions and a miniature autocollimator to measure two tilt angular errors of the axis of rotation. The assembly errors of the grid disc of the encoder and the mirror for autocollimator are also evaluated and compensated. The developed measuring device can be fixed inside the rotary stage. In the experiments, radial error motions of two points on the axis (h = 5 mm and 60 mm) were measured and calibrated with LVDTs, and the data showed that the radial error motions of the axis were less than 20 μm, and the calibration residual errors were less than 2 μm. When intermittent external forces were applied to the stage, the change of the stage's error motion could also be monitored accurately.
Keywords: radial error; real-time measurement; rotary stage; tilt error.