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Fluke 831 Laser Shaft Alignment Tool

Misalignment causes at least half of all damage to rotating machinery, but instead of fixing the problem, teams often just treat the symptoms by replacing bearings, couplings, and seals. The new Fluke 831 Laser Shaft Alignment Tool makes shaft alignment easy with an intuitive guided user interface that enables quick and complete shaft alignment without advanced training or complicated programs.
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Image sensor for virtual reality, drones, machine vision

OMNIVISION has just announced the OG0VE global shutter (GS) image sensor, a small-form-factor, high-sensitivity device for AR/VR/MR, metaverse, drone, machine vision, and barcode scanner products. This new-generation image sensor is 26% smaller and more than 50% more power efficient than its predecessor. It supports one-lane MIPI D-PHY at up to 800 Mbps and was designed to address the high market demand for the smallest and lowest power-consuming cameras.
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Smallest Smart Motor Module for DC fan applications

Alpha and Omega Semiconductor Limited has introduced an extension to its compact Smart Motor Module (SMM) family. Available in an ultra-compact, thermally enhanced 3-mm x 3-mm QFN-18L package, the highly integrated AOZ9530QV SMM is a half-bridge power stage with a slew of features and protections that simplify motor drive designs. It is suitable for use in a large number of BLDC fan applications ranging from PC and server fans to seat cooling and home appliances.
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Application Note: Wireless -- Decoupling high-frequency signals from a DC supply

From 5G systems to radio and antenna applications, wireless communication accompanies us throughout our daily lives, so the demand for universal high-frequency amplifiers is correspondingly high. By selecting the optimal passive components, the transmission characteristics of the amplifier can be improved during development. A well-designed layout further improves RF performance. The aim is to transmit both RF signals and the DC supply on a single line without interference or cross-talk. A key component is the inductor for decoupling the RF and DC supplies.
Read this in-depth Würth Elektronik application note.

Smallest all-in-one LIN driver propels relay window lifters

Melexis' new LIN pre-driver IC for relay DC motors offers a combination of high power, compactness, and attractive pricing. The MLX81160 is the latest addition to the company's Gen3 family of compatible embedded motor drivers. Its 48-KB of memory (16 KB ROM for the included LIN protocol and 32 KB Flash for the application software) is suitable for applications like window regulators.
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Pull-type solenoids in a range to meet tons of applications

Magnetic Sensor Systems (MSS) has released their S-20-100X model of high-efficiency, low-cost Pull Type Tubular Solenoids (1 in. diameter x 2 in. long). Their S-20-100X series features 18 different solenoids to select from based on the voltage, duty cycle, force, and stroke requirement of the user. MSS solenoid coils typically use Class F 23- to 40-AWG windings with Class A insulation for better protection of the solenoid during longer duty cycles. Applications include: vending machines, medical dispensing, mixing, valve control, farm machinery, disconnects, transmission shifting, fire suppression systems, cabinet locks, door controls, and sorting equipment.
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Industrial imaging at warp speed

When fast-moving scenes need to be captured in all their details, a high-performance transmission interface is essential in addition to the right sensor. With uEye Warp10, IDS Imaging Development Systems GmbH is launching a new camera family that, thanks to 10GigE, transmits data in the Gigabit Ethernet-based network at a very high frame rate and virtually without delay. The first models with the IMX250 (5 MP), IMX253 (12 MP), and IMX255 (8.9 MP) sensors from the Sony Pregius series are now available.
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Top Tech Tips: How to specify electric rod-style actuators for optimal performance, reliability, and efficiency

Andy Zaske, Vice President, Tolomatic, provides his 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.

Standard IP65 slip rings with short lead times

The Orbex Group, a leading manufacturer of high-performance electric motors and slip rings, introduces standard slip rings with an IP65 protection rating, providing washdown tolerance in many food, beverage, and pharmaceutical manufacturing applications. These washdown-ready slip rings feature stainless steel or aluminum housings. They offer flexible mounting options with through-hole diameters ranging from 25 to 100 mm, or capsule style when a through-hole is not required.
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New polymers engineered for e-motor applications

Freudenberg Sealing Technologies has expanded the use of its Thermally Conductive, Electrically Insulating (TCEI) materials to produce walled slot liners for electric motor applications. The company's TCEI material grades demonstrate superior thermal conductivity and better electrical insulation when tested against other thermoplastic materials currently available.
Read the full article.

Heatsink solutions for electronic housings

Phoenix Contact has increased the breadth and depth of its popular Industrial Case System (ICS) housing family to include both customizable passive heatsinks and heatsink fillers. New heatsink solutions allow design engineers to choose from a wide range of thermal management solutions to keep their components from overheating. To support the new heatsink solutions, a web-based, intuitive platform for thermal assessment has been incorporated into the Electronic Housing Online Configurator tool on Phoenix Contact's website.
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Mini-FAKRA cable assemblies for automotive and industrial applications requiring high data transfer rates

Amphenol RF has expanded its AUTOMATE Type A Mini-FAKRA product series with pre-configured cable assemblies. These assemblies feature a straight quad port mini-FAKRA jack on both ends and are designed on low-loss TFC-302LL. AUTOMATE assemblies support data transmission rates up to 20 Gbps, which makes them ideal for automotive and industrial applications that require high data transfer rates to communicate information for safety, performance, and entertainment without lag.
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New compact touchless linear position sensors

The TFD Series of touchless linear position sensors from Novotechnik provides wear-free operation in tight spaces. The TFD-4000 Series uses a magnetic position marker to provide a touchless measurement range of 0 to 14, 24, or 50 mm -- depending on model. These sensors make measurements through air and non-magnetic materials. Sensing direction can be either parallel or perpendicular to mounting holes. Applications include textile, packaging, and sheet metal machinery; medical applications; marine; mobile engine management; and construction, agricultural, and forestry machinery.
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Top Tech Tip:
2D, 3D, or 2.5D? Choosing a vision system for your automation project

If you're looking at machine vision systems for automation, you will need to decide whether to invest in a 2D, 3D, or 2.5D camera system. That choice will have a major impact on the deployment's cost, complexity, capabilities, and functionality. OnRobot's Kristian Hulgard, General Manager - Americas, explains the differences, benefits, and shortcomings of each system type.
Read this informative OnRobot article.

Next-generation electronic digital comparators

The Millimess 2000 W(i) and 2001 W(i) Digital Comparators from Mahr set new standards in metrology with unique and innovative features such as touch display, inductive measurement system, and integrated wireless connectivity. The systems combine practical and reliable operation with maximum precision using a unique inductive measuring system.
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New optical switch could lead to ultrafast all-optical signal processing

Engineers at Caltech in California have developed a switch -- one of the most fundamental components of computing -- using optical, rather than electronic, components. The development could aid efforts to achieve ultrafast all-optical signal processing and computing.

Optical devices have the capacity to transmit signals far faster than electrical devices by using pulses of light rather than electrical signals. That is why modern devices often employ optics to send data; for example, think of the fiberoptic cables that provide much faster internet speeds than conventional Ethernet cables.

The field of optics has the potential to revolutionize computing by doing more, at faster speeds, and with less power. However, one of the major limitations of optics-based systems at present is that, at a certain point, they still need to have electronics-based transistors to efficiently process the data.

Now, using the power of optical nonlinearity (more on that later), a team led by Alireza Marandi, assistant professor of electrical engineering and applied physics at Caltech, has created an all-optical switch. Such a switch could eventually enable data processing using photons. The research was published in the journal Nature Photonics on July 28.

Switches are among the simplest components of a computer. A signal comes into the switch and, depending on certain conditions, the switch either allows the signal to move forward or halts it. That on/off property is the foundation of logic gates and binary computation, and is what digital transistors were designed to accomplish. However, until this new work, achieving the same function with light has proved difficult. Unlike electrons in transistors, which can strongly affect each other's flow and thereby cause "switching," photons usually do not easily interact with each other.

Two things made the breakthrough possible: the material Marandi's team used, and the way in which they used it. First, they chose a crystalline material known as lithium niobate, a combination of niobium, lithium, and oxygen that does not occur in nature but has, over the past 50 years, proven essential to the field of optics. The material is inherently nonlinear: Because of the special way the atoms are arranged in the crystal, the optical signals that it produces as outputs are not proportional to the input signals.

An artist's illustration of an optical switch, splitting light pulses based on their energies. [Image credit: Y. Wang, N. Thu, and S. Zhou]

 

 

While lithium niobate crystals have been used in optics for decades, more recently, advances in nanofabrication techniques have enabled Marandi and his team to create lithium niobate-based integrated photonic devices that allow for the confinement of light in a tiny space. The smaller the space, the greater the intensity of light with the same amount of power. As a result, the pulses of light carrying information through such an optical system could provide a stronger nonlinear response than would otherwise be possible.

Marandi and his colleagues also confined the light temporally. Essentially, they decreased the duration of light pulses, and used a specific design that would keep the pulses short as they propagate through the device, which resulted in each pulse having higher peak power.

The combined effect of these two tactics -- the spatiotemporal confinement of light -- is to substantially enhance the strength of nonlinearity for a given pulse energy, which means the photons now affect each other much more strongly.

The net result is the creation of a nonlinear splitter in which the light pulses are routed to two different outputs based on their energies, which enables switching to occur in less than 50 femtoseconds (a femtosecond is a quadrillionth of a second). By comparison, state-of-the-art electronic switches take tens of picoseconds (a picosecond is a trillionth of a second), a difference of many orders of magnitude.

Source: Caltech

Published August 2022

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