Linear air bearings provide translation in a plane and are commonly found in supports for coordinate measuring machines, semiconductor pick-and-place machinery, gantry systems, micromachining centers, zero-gravity simulators, etc.  Our air bearings exhibit frictionless motion under static or high speed conditions and are orders of magnitude more accurate than even the finest mechnical rolling element type bearings.  are See our applications pages for more details.

They are made in a variety of shapes and configurations including round and rectangular with or without vacuum or magnetic preload.  Different types may be combined with spherical and/or cylindrical air bearings to achieve multiaxis frictionless motion.  Load capacities range from 1 kg to 10000 kg.  Our standard LRA and LRAP series air bearings are shown in the chart below.  Housing materials may include: stainless steel, aluminum, brass, glass, nickel, invar, Macor, PEEK, ceramic, graphite, carbon and others.

Available in both porous surface and discrete inlets.  Flying heights of bearings with discrete inlet sources are more similar from bearing to bearing.  Porous surface air bearings have better resistance to damage and misuse and they have a slightly higher load capacity for a given size; now with TRUEHeight ™ technology which eliminates the need for inlet restrictors to adjust flying heights.