Difference and Relationship Between Electric Cylinder Module and Other Linear Motion Mechanism

Difference and relationship between electric cylinder module and other linear motion mechanisms.

In recent years, with the continuous renewal and iteration of the whole automation industry, the development of linear transmission mechanism, as the upstream product of motion control industry, is changing with each passing day.

So what are the main types of linear motion mechanisms, and what is the difference between the electric cylinder module and them?
In terms of structure, function and power source, linear motion devices mainly include the following:
（1） Rack and pinion drive
The gear rack has the advantages of simple structure, large load, unlimited travel extension and fast transmission speed. The disadvantages are high noise, poor accuracy, large loss, and the lubricating grease is not conducive to environmental protection. Elevator is a typical application case in construction.
（2） Synchronous belt synchronous wheel drive
The advantages of the synchronous belt synchronous wheel are simple and compact structure, good wear resistance and good aging resistance. It is suitable for long stroke transmission, convenient maintenance and high cost performance. The disadvantage is that the load is small, the accuracy is low, and it can not be installed vertically.
（3） Linear motor drive
Linear motor, also known as linear motor, is a transmission mechanism that directly produces linear motion without passing through the intermediate conversion mechanism. Because of its simple structure and less motion inertia, it has high running speed, response speed, positioning accuracy and service life.
（4） Electric push rod drive
Electric push rod, also known as linear driver, has the advantages of large load, small volume, good self-locking, safety and environmental protection, and the disadvantage is that it can not bear radial load. It has a wide range of applications, such as heavy agricultural machinery, electric air window, stage lifting, smart home and so on.
（5） Screw drive
Screw drive is a simple unit in linear drive device, which mainly includes trapezoidal screw, ball screw and roller screw.
The trapezoidal screw is sliding friction, and the transmission efficiency is only about 50%. The temperature rises greatly during operation, so it is not suitable for high-speed transmission. But it has certain self-locking.
The ball screw is mainly composed of screw, nut and ball. It is the core component of the sliding table of the ball screw driven module and the core component of the electric cylinder. Its working principle is that the steel ball between the screw shaft and the nut makes rolling movement, with small friction coefficient, transmission efficiency of more than 90%, and high transmission accuracy and stability. The disadvantage is that it cannot be self-locking.
Roller screw is superior to trapezoidal screw and ball screw in all aspects of performance, but its application range is not as wide as the former because of its high price.
（6） Cylinder
The cylinder is also a common component in the field of automation control and industrial robot. It takes the compressed gas produced by the supporting air compressor as the power source. The advantages are strong adaptability to the working environment, dustproof and waterproof, and normal operation in high and low temperature environment. The disadvantage is that various pneumatic pipelines need to be maintained regularly, which has the risk of air leakage, large loss, high maintenance cost, continuous pressure supply, poor stability, slow response speed, high noise and general positioning accuracy.
（7） Hydraulic cylinder
Like cylinder, hydraulic cylinder is also widely used in industrial automation. Because of its low speed, high load and high impact load resistance, it is especially suitable for heavy industry, such as metallurgical forging. However, because its power source is hydraulic oil, the maintenance cost is also high and the loss is large. The transmission efficiency is the same as that of the cylinder, less than 50%, and the positioning accuracy is general.
（8） Electric cylinder and module slide
The electric cylinder and module slide are upgraded units following the linear motion mechanisms such as ball screw, linear motor and electric push rod. Its working principle is to convert the forward and reverse rotation motion of the motor into an electric driving device for the linear reciprocating motion of the electric cylinder (or module slide).
With the development of industrialization, electric cylinder will replace hydraulic cylinder and cylinder more and more widely because of its characteristics of high speed, high precision, high load, high transmission efficiency, safety and environmental protection. The single axis and multi axis combination (gantry type, coordinate type, desktop type, etc.) of the linear module slide is also used as the functional actuator of displacement, load and grasping in various mechanical equipment and intelligent manipulator in automatic production, so as to realize centralized control, remote control, high-precision control and automatic circular motion.

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