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New Exlar food-grade actuator

Curtiss-Wright's Actuation Division has expanded its Exlar line with hygienic electric actuators using FDA-approved materials and finishes. Designed for food, beverage, packaging, and pharmaceutical automation, the new GTF unit enables economical USDA, 3-A, BISSC, and EHEDG certification. Its IP69K washdown option, inverted roller screw, and compact servo-driven design deliver reliable, high-performance motion for hygienic machinery.
Learn more.

New Texas conveyor system is 42 miles long!

SEW-EURODRIVE is helping power one of the most ambitious bulk material handling projects in North America through its contribution to the Dune Express conveyor system, a record-setting 42-mile single-flight conveyor across the Permian Basin.
Read the full article.

Compact servo drives for harsh environs

Built on Copley's proven NanoPlus platform, the compact, 1.2-oz R-Series Nano servo drives withstand extreme temperatures, vibration, shock, and humidity. Available in R47 (CANopen) and R48 (EtherCAT) models, they suit space-constrained, harsh environments such as mil/aero robotics and gimbals. This commercial off-the-shelf series provides a hardened option without defense-specific development lead times.
Learn more from Copley Controls.

Hybrid actuator with force up to 14,726 lb

Kyntronics' new all-electric HyCore hybrid actuator is a compact, low-cost alternative to traditional hydraulic, pneumatic, and electro-mechanical systems. Engineered for OEMs, it delivers up to 14,726 lb of force. The self-contained design eliminates leaks and wear, providing precise control, shock-load tolerance, and high efficiency. It simplifies integration and lowers operating costs for mobile equipment, packaging, assembly automation, and more.
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SDP/SI motion products: Best sellers

SDP/SI's best sellers aren't just popular -- they're proven. These are the motion components their customers return to time and again for precision, reliability, and unbeatable value. From belts and pulleys to gears, bearings, and couplings, each product has earned its place through consistent performance in real-world applications.
Learn more and see the full products list.

Automated part grinding and finishing in one unit!

Grinding large fabrications is a classic dull, dirty, and dangerous task perfectly suited for automation, yet traditional setups require multiple costly robots. At Automate 2026, Güdel debuted a single-robot solution that utilizes two extra degrees of freedom to finish massive surfaces without complex part repositioning.
Read the full article.

Rockford RBS ball screws and nuts now available

Automation-Direct now offers US-manufactured RBS ball screws and nuts for precise linear motion in OEM and maintenance applications. Achieving over 90% efficiency, they feature low friction, high accuracy, and minimal wear. Available in various diameters, lengths, and leads, these precision-matched components handle axial loads with minimal backlash, providing a dependable solution that reduces maintenance and extends operational life. Great prices too.
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Next-gen conveyor transports 3,000-kg payloads

Building on its established portfolio of twin-strand conveyors that are currently used in a variety of industry verticals, Bosch Rexroth is introducing the TS 7plus transfer system, which is the world's first freely configurable, fully electric conveyance solution to workpieces weighing up to 3,000 kg. TS 7plus transports material via conveyor rollers on freely configurable modular sections with lift/transverse, rotary, and positioning units, as well as stop gates. Great for automotive, battery, aerospace/defense, and more.
Learn more.

Next-generation air bearing linear slide

The A-123 noncontact nanoposi-tioning stage integrates a brushless motor, air bearings, and a 1-nm encoder, supporting 40-kg payloads over 750-mm travel. Its pressurized air film eliminates the friction, wear, and vibration of mechanical stages, ensuring zero particle generation. Customizable with options such as granite bases and isolation systems, it is ideal for semiconductor metrology, inspection, photonics, and more.
Learn more.

How to implement redundancy in stepper motors

Some of the recent research activities in the area of electric motor drives for safety-critical applications (such as aerospace and nuclear power plants) are focused on looking at various fault-tolerant motor and drive topologies. After discussing different solutions, this article focuses on a miniature permanent magnet (PM) stepper motor design that provides increased redundancy.
Read this informative FAULHABER article.

Teradyne Robotics unveils a multitude of deployable AI applications at Automate 2026

Teradyne Robotics, the company behind Universal Robots (UR) and Mobile Industrial Robots (MiR), will demonstrate how physical AI is transforming industrial automation at Automate 2026 in Chicago, June 22-25 at booth #1250. The demos presented are real, deployable, and ready for purchase. They include assembly, pick-and-place, palletizing, mobile robots, and more. A lot of good new offerings here. Check it out.
Read the full article.

Affordable nanometer-level precision focus stage

Zaber Technologies has launched the DMA Objective Focus Stage, a compact, linear motor solution for microscope OEMs. Starting at $4,500 with an integrated controller, it offers 50-nm repeatability and sub-15-ms settling times -- matching piezo precision at one-third the cost. Featuring plug-and-play architecture, a developer-friendly API, and a tiny footprint, it accelerates high-throughput workflows like spatial biology and digital pathology.
Learn more.

How Ford automated a moving EV assembly line with vision-guided robots: Inbolt case study

Automating moving assembly lines is highly challenging. At Ford's Cologne Electric Vehicle Center in Germany, applying pressure to water shields on vehicle bodies required following a precise path on unsynchronized, continuously moving vehicle carriers. To automate this, Ford deployed two Universal Robots cobots equipped with Inbolt 3D cameras. Using real-time vision guidance, the robots track vehicle positions and adapt on the fly. The result? Near-zero repairs, reliable moving-line automation, and new possibilities for tasks like tightening operations.
View the video.

Inbolt launches vision-enabled Robot Programming, closing the loop from CAD to factory floor

Inbolt is launching two new capabilities that complete the company's AI Vision Model for robot guidance at Automate 2026 in Chicago, June 22-25. With Robot Programming and Robot Control, Inbolt covers the full path from virtual commissioning to adaptive robot motion control, for stationary and moving-line applications. It's one platform from perception to motion -- on the robots manufacturers already own.
Read the full article.

Top Tech Tip: How to specify electric rod-style actuators for optimal performance, reliability, and efficiency

The engineers at Tolomatic provide their Top 10 Tips for specifying electric rod-style actuators, which have a higher initial cost, more advanced design, and more predictable performance compared to fluid power cylinders. This is a really thorough presentation filled with useful information.
Read the full article.

Vertical turbines could be the future for wind farms

The now-familiar sight of traditional propeller wind turbines could be replaced in the future with wind farms containing more compact and efficient vertical turbines. New research from Oxford Brookes University in the UK has found that the vertical turbine design is far more efficient than traditional turbines in large-scale wind farms, and, when set in pairs, the vertical turbines increase each other's performance by up to 15%.

A research team from the School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics (ECM) at Oxford Brookes led by Professor Iakovos Tzanakis conducted an in-depth study using more than 11,500 hours of computer simulation to show that wind farms can perform more efficiently by substituting the traditional propeller-type Horizontal Axis Wind Turbines (HAWTs) for compact Vertical Axis Wind Turbines (VAWTs).

Vertical turbines are more efficient than traditional windmill turbines
The research demonstrates for the first time, at a realistic scale, the potential of large-scale VAWTs to outcompete current HAWT wind farm turbines.

Farm of Vertical Axis Wind Turbines. [Credit: Oxford Brookes University]

 

 

VAWTs spin around an axis vertical to the ground, and they exhibit the opposite behavior of the well-known propeller design (HAWTs). The research found that VAWTs increase each other's performance when arranged in grid formations. Positioning wind turbines to maximize outputs is critical to the design of wind farms.

"The future of wind farms should be vertical," said Tzanakis. "Vertical axis wind farm turbines can be designed to be much closer together, increasing their efficiency and ultimately lowering the prices of electricity. In the long run, VAWTs can help accelerate the green transition of our energy systems, so that more clean and sustainable energy comes from renewable sources."

With the UK's wind energy capacity expected to almost double by 2030, the findings are a stepping stone toward designing more efficient wind farms, understanding large-scale wind energy harvesting techniques, and, ultimately, improving the renewable energy technology to replace fossil fuels more quickly as sources of energy.

Cost-effective way to meet wind power targets
According to the Global Wind Report 2021, the world needs to be installing wind power three times faster over the next decade in order to meet net-zero targets and avoid the worst impacts of climate change.

"Modern wind farms are one of the most efficient ways to generate green energy, however, they have one major flaw: as the wind approaches the front row of turbines, turbulence will be generated downstream," said Joachim Toftegaard Hansen, lead author of the report and Bachelor of Engineering graduate. "The turbulence is detrimental to the performance of the subsequent rows.

"In other words, the front row will convert about half the kinetic energy of the wind into electricity, whereas for the back row, that number is down to 25 to 30%. Each turbine costs more than £2-million/MW. As an engineer, it naturally occurred to me that there must be a more cost-effective way."

The study, published in the International Journal of Renewable Energy, is the first to analyze many aspects of wind turbine performance comprehensively with regard to array angle, direction of rotation, turbine spacing, and number of rotors. It is also the first research to investigate whether the performance improvements hold true for three VAWT turbines set in a series.

"The importance of using computational methods in understanding flow physics can't be underestimated," said Dr. Mahak Mahak, co-author of the article and senior lecturer in ECM. "These types of design and enhancement studies are a fraction of the cost compared to the huge experimental test facilities. This is particularly important at the initial design phase and is extremely useful for the industries trying to achieve maximum design efficiency and power output."

Source: Oxford Brookes University

Published May 2021

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