Contactless handling systems used to accurately position and move substrates in the order of microns can be mechanically driven by actuators. However, these actuators require high actuation forces of up to 140 N due to the high internal stiffness of the contactless handling systems, which can be modeled as stator-mover systems (SMS’s) with a mover capable of moving up to 3 degrees of freedom (DoF). This MSc thesis report shows the development and realisation of a passive stiffness compensation design for a uniform SMS in translational 1 DoF, using only small displacements in the sub micron level. A uniform SMS was created with a mover that was able to displace in the same range of motion as the largest possible displacement of the investigated contactless handling systems: between -65 µm and 65 µm. After classification on stiffness compensation techniques, a concept was developed based on magnetic circuits using C-shaped yokes and air gaps between the yokes and mover. It was found that the the magnetic circuit concept was able to deliver high forces to introduce a negative stiffness and a magnetic force of 74.84 N at maximum displacement was obtained analytically for a 1 DoF translation. A final design was made using an optimisation on the C-shaped yoke, kinetostatic modeling on the SMS and computations on analytical and numerical fields, which together showed promising stiffness compensating behaviour for the SMS design. A 1 DoF SMS demonstrator was developed and manufactured which contained sheet flexures that ensured the translational motion in x-direction and the ability of an adaptable flexure length to adapt the internal stiffness and adaptable air gap length to adapt the magnetic force. The 1 DoF SMS was validated experimentally to show the internal stiffness and stiffness compensation of the SMS. The stiffnesses were measured using a vibration test to find the eigenfrequencies of the system and a static load test to determine the force-displacement relationship. Stiffness compensations were observed for all investigated combinations of
flexure length and air gap length. A maximum passive compensation of 56.7% was obtained in the 1 DoF SMS, which turned out to have smaller internal stiffnesses than the contactless handling system. Nevertheless, the developed stiffness compensation design shows its potential for a next iteration in which an implementation in contactless handling systems could be possible.