Ultrasonic processing system having a piezoelectric force sensor

Abstract

The present invention concerns an apparatus for ultrasonic processing of materials having an ultrasonic processing system comprising an ultrasound generator, a converter, a sonotrode and a counterpart tool and a feed unit with which the sonotrode and the counterpart tool can be moved towards each other or away from each other, wherein there is provided a force sensor with which the force that the ultrasonic processing system exerts on the materials to be processed can be measured. To provide a corresponding ultrasonic processing apparatus which allows a greater processing speed it is proposed according to the invention that the force sensor is a piezoelectric sensor whose output is converted into an electrical voltage by means of a charge amplifier and that there is provided a control device which either when the ultrasonic processing is not performing material processing short-circuits the piezoelectric sensor or adds a time-varying force compensation unit to the value measured by the piezoelectric sensor.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.