89T

A lapping carrier is a workholding plate used in double-sided planetary lapping and related finishing processes. An insert carrier is a variant that uses removable inserts to locate parts during double-sided processing. Carriers of this class travel between opposed plates while keeping workpieces separated and presented to the abrasive process.

Double-sided planetary lapping carriers hold multiple parts in openings or inserts while the parts are processed between an upper plate and a lower plate. Planetary motion drives the carrier through the working zone so both faces of the parts are acted on during the cycle. The carrier sets the spacing, orientation, and containment of the workpieces while slurry or polishing media performs material removal.

Double-sided lapping carriers are used during precision thickness, flatness, and parallelism generation steps on discrete parts and substrates. The carrier sits at the material-removal stage between earlier slicing or grinding operations and later cleaning, inspection, or finer finishing steps. Insert carriers serve the same general position when the process needs more controlled part location or handling.

Carriers of this class are used for processing small precision parts, wafers, and substrates that need both faces finished in one machine pass. Typical use cases include lapping and polishing of brittle materials, ceramics, semiconductors, optical materials, and metal components where controlled spacing between parts is required.