Ball Screws

Steinmeyer, Inc. offers the "world's smallest commercially available ball screw." These ULTRAMINIATURE ball screws are available in diameters as small as 3 millimeter with a choice of two pitches – 1 millimeter or 0.5 millimeter, making this product ideal for medical applications, among others. Steinmeyer offers an extensive range of miniature screws from 16 mm diameter (with up to 30 mm pitch), down to this incredibly tiny 3 mm diameter.  The ball screws are equipped with one of four types of ball nuts (cylindrical, flange, etc.), with or without preload.  And, as with all other Steinmeyer ball screws, custom lengths are available with journals machined to a control drawing.

These Ultraminiature ball  screws are manufactured from standard tool steel (52100), hardened and then precision ground to meet ISO tolerances from P0 to P5.  Stainless steel material is available as an option.  Such high efficiency ball screws provide the perfect precision linear drive mechanism for a wide variety of medical devices. Because ball screws offer significantly higher efficiency compared to lead screws, they require smaller and thus lower power motors.  This not only saves battery life on portable devices, but the high efficiency also means lower heating and much longer life.  And they are capable of being back driven, an important prerequisite when it comes to tactile systems. The higher the efficiency, the better the force feedback!