Motion system

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title: "Motion system" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["systems-engineering"] description: "Component of test and measurement system" topic_path: "engineering" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_system" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Component of test and measurement system ::

Motion system in engineering and systems, is a component of a test and measurement system that provides motion to a load or loads in a one or many directions. Generally a motion system is made up of a set (or stack) of linear and rotational stages. A linear stage moves in a straight line, while a rotation stage moves in a partial or full circle. A stage can either be manually controlled with a knob control, or automated with a motion controller.

A motion system generally is computer controlled and can perform fast, reliable, repeatable, and accurate positioning of loads. Most systems will support motion in the horizontal plane (x and y directions), which is referred to as an xy stack. Often either a vertical motion along the z axis (up/down motion) or rotational motion (r axis) is placed on top of the xy stack.

For automated stages, a scale can be attached to the internals of the stage and an encoder used to measure the position on the scale and report this to the controller, thereby determining the precise position of the stage. This allows for a motion controller to reliably and repeatably move to set positions with the linear stage.

Gallery

File:Kreuztisch 1.jpg|A coordinate table provides linear motion in an xy plane File:Hexapod0a.png|A hexapod, like a Stewart platform, provides six degrees of freedom

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::