Designfax weekly eMagazine

Subscribe Today!

Archives

View Archives

Partners

Manufacturing Center
Product Spotlight

Modern Applications News
Metalworking Ideas For
Today's Job Shops

Tooling and Production
Strategies for large
metalworking plants

hyperMILL 2024 CAD/CAM software suite

OPEN MIND Technologies has introduced its latest hyperMILL 2024 CAD/CAM software suite, which includes a range of powerful enhancements to its core toolpath capabilities, as well as new functionality for increased NC programming efficiency in applications ranging from 2.5D machining to 5-axis milling. New and enhanced capabilities include: Optimized Deep Hole Drilling, a new algorithm for 3- and 5-axis Rest Machining, an enhanced path layout for the 3D Plane Machining cycle, better error detection, and much more.
Learn more.

One-part epoxy changes from red to clear under UV

Master Bond UV15RCL is a low-viscosity, cationic-type UV-curing system with a special color-changing feature. The red material changes to clear once exposed to UV light, indicating that there is UV light access across the adhesive material. Although this change in color from red to clear does not indicate a full cure, it does confirm that the UV light has reached the polymer. This epoxy is an excellent electrical insulator. UV15RCL adheres well to metals, glass, ceramics, and many plastics, including acrylics and polycarbonates.
Learn more.

SPIROL Press-N-Lok™ Pin for plastic housings

The Press-N-Lok™ Pin was designed to permanently retain two plastic components to each other. As the pin is inserted, the plastic backfills into the area around the two opposing barbs, resulting in maximum retention. Assembly time is quicker, and it requires lower assembly equipment costs compared to screws and adhesives -- just Press-N-Lok™!
Learn more about the new Press-N-Lok™ Pin.

Why hybrid bearings are becoming the new industry standard

A combination of steel outer and inner rings with ceramic balls or rollers is giving hybrid bearings unique properties, making them suitable for use in a wide range of modern applications. SKF hybrid bearings make use of silicon nitride (twice as hard as bearing steel) rolling elements and are available as ball bearings, cylindrical roller bearings, and in custom designs. From electric erosion prevention to friction reduction and extended maintenance intervals, learn all about next-gen hybrid bearings.
Read the SKF technical article.

3M and Ansys train engineers on simulating adhesives

Ansys and 3M have created an advanced simulation training program enabling engineers to enhance the design and sustainability of their products when using tapes and adhesives as part of the design. Simulation enables engineers to validate engineering decisions when analyzing advanced polymeric materials -- especially when bonding components made of different materials. Understand the behavior of adhesives under real-world conditions for accurate modeling and design.
Read this informative Ansys blog.

New FATH T-slotted rail components in black from AutomationDirect

Automation-Direct has added a wide assortment of black-colored FATH T-slotted hardware components to match their SureFrame black anodized T-slotted rails, including: cube connectors (2D and 3D) and angle connectors, joining plates of many types, brackets, and pivot joints. Also included are foot consoles, linear bearings in silver and black, cam lever brakes, and L-handle brakes. FATH T-slotted hardware components are easy to install, allow for numerous T-slotted structure configurations, and have a 1-year warranty against defects.
Learn more.

Weird stuff: Moon dust simulant for 3D printing

Crafted from a lunar regolith simulant, Basalt Moon Dust Filamet™ (not a typo) available from The Virtual Foundry closely mirrors the makeup of lunar regolith found in mare regions of the Moon. It enables users with standard fused filament fabrication (FFF) 3D printers to print with unparalleled realism. Try out your ideas before you go for that big space contract, or help your kid get an A on that special science project.
Learn more.

Break the mold with custom injection molding by Rogan

With 90 years of industry experience, Rogan Corporation possesses the expertise to deliver custom injection molding solutions that set businesses apart. As a low-cost, high-volume solution, injection molding is the most widely used plastics manufacturing process. Rogan processes include single-shot, two-shot, overmolding, and assembly. Elevate your parts with secondary operations: drilling and tapping, hot stamping, special finishes, punch press, gluing, painting, and more.
Learn more.

World's first current-carrying fastening technology

PEM^® eConnect™ current-carrying pins from Penn-Engineering provide superior electrical connections in applications that demand high performance from internal components, such as automotive electronics. This first-to-market tech provides repeatable, consistent electrical joints and superior installation unmatched by traditional fastening methods. Features include quick and secure automated installation, no hot spots or poor conductivity, and captivation options that include self-clinching and broaching styles.
Learn more about eConnect pins.

New interactive digital catalog from EXAIR

EXAIR's latest catalog offers readers an incredible source of innovative solutions for common industrial problems like conveying, cooling, cleaning, blowoff, drying, coating, and static buildup. This fully digital and interactive version of Catalog 35 is designed for easy browsing and added accessibility. Customers can view, download, print, and save either the full catalog or specific pages and sections. EXAIR products are designed to conserve compressed air and increase personnel safety in the process. Loaded with useful information.
Check out EXAIR's online catalog.

5 cost-saving design tips for CNC machining

Make sure your parts meet expectations the first time around. Xometry's director of application engineering, Greg Paulsen, presents five expert tips for cutting costs when designing custom CNC machined parts. This video covers corners and radii, designing for deep pockets, thread depths, thin walls, and more. Always excellent info from Paulsen at Xometry.
View the video.

What can you secure with a retaining ring? 20 examples

From the watch dial on your wrist to a wind turbine, no application is too small or too big for a Smalley retaining ring to secure. Light to heavy-duty loads? Carbon steel to exotic materials? No problem. See how retaining rings are used in slip clutches, bike locks, hip replacements, and even the Louvre Pyramid.
See the Smalley design applications.

Load fasteners with integrated RFID

A crane, rope, or chain may be required when something needs lifting -- plus anchoring points on the load. JW Winco offers a wide range of solutions to fasten the load securely, including: lifting eye bolts and rings (with or without rotation), eye rings with ball bearings, threaded lifting pins, shackles, lifting points for welding, and more. Some, such as the GN 581 Safety Swivel Lifting Eye Bolts, even have integrated RFID tags to clearly identify specific lifting points during wear and safety inspections and manage them digitally and without system interruption.
Learn more.

Couplings solve misalignments more precisely with targeted center designs

ALS Couplings from Miki Pulley feature a simplistic, three-piece construction and are available in three different types for more precisely handling parallel, angular, or axial misalignment applications. The key feature of this coupling design is its center element. Each of the three models has a center member that has a unique and durable material and shape. Also called a "spider," the center is designed to address and resolve the type of misalignment targeted. Ideal for unidirectional continuous movement or rapid bidirectional motion.
Learn more.

What is 3D-MID? Molded parts with integrated electronics from HARTING

3D-MID (three-dimensional mechatronic integrated devices) technology combines electronic and mechanical functionalities into a single, 3D component. It replaces the traditional printed circuit board and opens up many new opportunities. It takes injection-molded parts and uses laser-direct structuring to etch areas of conductor structures, which are filled with a copper plating process to create very precise electronic circuits. HARTING, the technology's developer, says it's "Like a PCB, but 3D." Tons of possibilities.
View the video.

Analysis of email traffic suggests remote work may stifle innovation

By Michaela Jarvis, MIT

The debate over what is lost when remote work replaces an in-person workplace just got an infusion of much-needed data. According to a study conducted at MIT, when workers go remote, the types of work relationships that encourage innovation tend to be hard hit.

Two-and-a-half years after Covid-19 shut down offices and research labs around the world, "We can finally use data to address a critical question: How did the pandemic-induced adoption of remote working affect our creativity and innovation on the job?" says Carlo Ratti, professor of Urban Technology and Planning and director of MIT's Senseable City Lab. "Until now, we could only guess. Today we can finally start to put real data behind those hypotheses."

The MIT researchers, with colleagues at Texas A&M University, Italian National Research Council, Technical University of Denmark, and Oxford University, analyzed aspects of a de-identified email network comprising 2,834 MIT research staff, faculty, and postdoctoral researchers for 18 months starting in December 2019. All of the emails were anonymized and examined to analyze the network structure of their origins and destinations, not their content.

Toward late March 2019, the Covid pandemic abruptly ended much of the on-site research on MIT's campus. With the shift to remote work, the new study shows, email communications between different research units fell off, leading to a decrease in what researchers call the "weak ties" that undergird the exchange of new ideas that tend to foster innovation.

Weak ties were defined as any connection between two people who had no mutual contact in the email network. In other words, two people, A and B, formed a weak tie if there was no third person C that both of them also contacted. "Strong ties," on the other hand, which are the type of communication that tends to expose us to the same ideas repeatedly, increased. Over the course of the lockdown, the researchers found that "ego networks," referring to an individual's unique web of connections, became more stagnant, with contacts becoming more similar each week.

The study was published in the August 22 issue of Nature Computational Science.

The researchers hypothesized that physical proximity should play a role in the development of weak ties. As such, weak ties between researchers in physically distant labs, who would be unlikely to encounter each other by chance even when working on campus, should not have dropped significantly when workers went remote. The data turned out to support that hypothesis, the team reports.

"Our research shows that co-location is a crucial factor to foster weak ties," says Paolo Santi, researcher at MIT's Senseable City Lab and at the Italian National Research Council. "Our data showed that weak ties evaporated at MIT starting on March 23, 2020, with a 38 percent drop," he says. Over the next 18 months, the drop translated into an estimated cumulative loss of more than 5,100 new weak ties.

The idea that "weak ties" are conducive to innovation dates back to research published in 1973 by sociologist Mark Granovetter, who wrote that "an initially unpopular innovation spread by those with few weak ties is more likely to be confined to a few cliques. ... Individuals with many weak ties are, by my arguments, best placed to diffuse such a difficult innovation." Granovetter's research was "just the beginning of a vast literature in sociology, which has subsequently confirmed and substantiated his ideas," Ratti says.

In an accompanying commentary article in Nature Computational Science, John Meluso of the University of Vermont calls the "weak ties" idea "one of the oldest theories in social networks," while pointing out that what generates and maintains the ties has remained vague. He notes that the new study's computational techniques shed light on the causal mechanism of "propinquity," the idea that proximity increases the odds of creating new connections and strengthening existing ones.

The researchers investigated not only the abrupt decline in weak ties when the MIT campus was shut down, but also the transition when researchers began returning to campus on July 15, 2021. A partial reinstatement of weak ties occurred after that point, the team found. With these findings, the researchers created a model that predicted that a complete return to the workplace would result in a "complete recovery of weak ties."

Ratti and his colleagues suggest that as companies and organizations refine their post-lockdown remote work policies, they should try to find ways to encourage serendipitous interactions across departments and research units to foster the spread of new and diverse information. As Ratti explains, those interactions create exposure for those involved to "a diverse set of people and ideas." At the same time, the study authors acknowledged that remote or hybrid work offers advantages to individuals, especially in terms of flexibility.

"Employers would make a mistake in discarding the newfound flexibility of the Covid years," Ratti says. "Our study hints at the fact that establishing a work balance tradeoff by combining in-person and remote interactions among colleagues seems to be the optimal solution, which could inform the transition to a hybrid, post-Covid-19 'new normal.'"

Achieving that balance could involve modeling the minimum amount of in-person work needed to keep weak ties activated. It could also involve transforming traditional office floor plans designed for individual tasks into "more open, dynamic spaces that encourage the so-called cafeteria effect," in which people from diverse groups sit and converse together, or event-based spaces for different communities to converge, Ratti says.

Published September 2022

Rate this article