Volume 5 (2020) - Issue 1 (Apr 2020)

Design and Test of a multi-axis acoustic -levitation device for non-contact dust removal from precision instruments

Yudi Niu ¹ , Yifan Pu ² , Xiaoqi Che ³ , Hong Gao ³ , Mei Wang ^3,*

¹ School of Biomedical Engineering, Beihang University, 100191, China, Beijing, Beijing 100191, China
² School of Automation Science and Electrical Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China, Beijing, Beijing 100191, China
³ Department of Physics, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China, Beijing, Beijing 100191, China
^*Authors to whom correspondence should be addressed.

Received: 2019-12-18 / Accepted: 2020-4-10 / Published: 2020-4-22

PDF Main Manuscript (824.09 KB)

DOI: https://doi.org/10.37906/real.2020.3

Abstract To overcome the drawback that conventional dust removing method, such as electrostatic suspension or direct wiping with special lens paper, can cause damage to precision instruments and their dependence on specific dust particle properties, we present a novel acoustic-levitation device design which incorporates an initial design of a multi-axis levitation device by Marzo.A with our enhancement model based on the variation of transducers numbers and their spacing to achieve the dust removing efficiency and feasibility in real dust removal process. In this work, modeling simulation in COMSOL Multiphysics and light absorbance experiment are utilized to evaluate the distribution of acoustic fields, movement trajectory of dust particles, and dust removing efficiency. With the manufactured device based on our design, further work is carried out to characterize the varying factors that may influence the removing efficiency when output voltage generated onto motor driven board is altered, experiment shows 27.5 V is the most efficient voltage output with highest dust removal proportion in actual removing operations. The study demonstrates our design achieves higher dust removing efficiency comparing to conventional methods. Whereas our design serves the purpose to solve a practical industrial problem, this paper also shows how it can be taken into the classroom as an demonstration experiment, providing an animated way to visualize the nodes and antinodes by the levitation position of particles thus to help the students in not only understanding the physical properties of standing waves but also the connection from a classroom lab to an industrial solution.

Research Areas: Research methodology, Scientific reasoning & problem solving, Student preparation, Technology

Keywords: acoustic levitation device；, non-contact dust removal, precision instrument