An interest in home metal work brought me to Electro Discharge Machining (EDM). EDM brought me to wanting a very flexible positioning system, so that the EDM electrode could be both accurately and arbitrarily places around a volume of metal. Wanting flexible, accurate positioning brought me to the Stewart Platform.
I won't attempt to outline the invention and uses of the Stewart Platform, as there are good references on the web. For my purposes it was important that it allowed arbitrary positioning in X, Y, Z, roll, pitch, and yaw.
Interestingly, the Stewart Platform is used an many different scales. Originally developed for positioning cockpit modules in flight simulators, it is also used at the nano-scale for micro-machining, atomic force microscopes (AFM), and other very small applications.
My requirements are more modest.
I want a device which will allow positioning over the range of an eight inch cube (more or less). I want to be able to handle tool loads (machining forces) of up to about ten pounds-force. [ed. I should be using MKS system, but am not trained enough in it yet. For now, I'll stay in English units -- one less learning curve to climb.]
As one project begets another, I will see if I can find a good way to document this project online. If I can modify the family photo album scripts to allow good intermixing of images and text ...
Email me with comments, criticisms, suggestions, or whatever.