Development Approach of Actuators for High Loads Based on Shape Memory Alloys

In order to increase precision and productivity in production systems, active components are increasingly being used which operate on the basis of conventional principles such as electrodynamics, hydraulics or pneumatics. An increasing performance range leads to larger demands in terms of function and energy density, which conventional actuators can only fulfil to a limited extent. Thermal shape memory alloys are the basis of an actuator technology that can overcome these challenges, but have recently been researched and used mainly as wire actuators. The associated drawbacks regarding realizable forces and large installation space may be the reasons why shape memory alloys have not yet been established in the field of production technology. This paper presents an alternative form of using shape memory alloys, which makes it possible to realize significantly higher energy densities. Starting from specific use cases, the basic design is discussed and a developed design methodology for such actuators is presented. This methodology is validated by measurements. Finally, an exemplary actuator concept is presented.

ANaN — ANalyse And Navigate: Debugging Compute Clusters with Techniques from Functional Programming and Text Stream Processing

Monitoring is an indispensable tool for the operation of any large installation of grid or cluster computing, be it high energy physics or elsewhere. Usually, monitoring is configured to collect a small amount of data, just enough to enable detection of abnormal conditions. Once detected, the abnormal condition is handled by gathering all information from the affected components. This data is processed by querying it in a manner similar to a database. This contribution shows how the metaphor of a debugger (for software applications) can be transferred to a compute cluster. The concepts of variables, assertions and breakpoints that are used in debugging can be applied to monitoring by defining variables as the quantities recorded by monitoring and breakpoints as invariants formulated via these variables. It is found that embedding fragments of a data extracting and reporting tool such as the UNIX tool awk facilitates concise notations for commonly used variables since tools like awk are designed to process large event streams (in textual representations) with bounded memory. A functional notation similar to both the pipe notation used in the UNIX shell and the point-free style used in functional programming simplify the combination of variables that commonly occur when formulating breakpoints.

Dismantling and decontamination of large-sized radiation-contaminated equipment during Research Building B decommissioning at the Bochvar Institute site

The article presents the results of work on dismantling the large installation equipment of Research Building B at the Bochvar High-technology Research Institute of Inorganic Materials (Bochvar Institute). The works were carried out as part of Building B preparation for decommissioning. The purpose of dismantling the large-sized capacitive equipment was to reconstruct the large installation site for managing radioactive waste generated during Building B decommissioning. The works on decommissioning a radioactively contaminated building within a densely populated district of megalopolis were carried out for the first time. The characteristics of the large-sized capacitive equipment are presented. Radioactive contamination of the capacitive equipment is determined by long-lived a-emitting isotopes: 235U, 238U, 239Pu. The sequence of works on dismantling the radiation-contaminated capacitive equipment includes preparatory work, dismantling the tank piping, localizing radioactive contamination of the external surface of the equipment as well as dismantling and moving it into a transport container. Dismantling and decontamination of the large-sized capacitive equipment was carried out by the Bochvar Institute Decommissioning Department. The following tools were used during the works: (1) a mobile foam decontamination facility to perform decontamination works and (2) a mobile high pressure facility to apply localizing and decontaminating film coatings. The tanks were dismantled by means of low-spark tools, i.e., reciprocating saws. Crane runways were made in order to move the dismantled equipment into transport containers: the movement was carried out with the help of a winch. The main results of dismantling and decontaminating the radioactively contaminated tanks are the dismantling of four units of long-length column-type equipment with heights from 4.2 to 6.4 m and 26 units of capacitive equipment (maximum capacity = 8 m3) as well as decontamination of the internal surfaces of radiation-contaminated equipment (decontamination factor = 25–70). As a result, the activity of the accumulated radioactive waste was reduced (the RW class was changed from 3 to 4). The main conclusion regarding the managment of large-sized radiation-contaminated tanks during Building B decommissioning is as follows: the works were organized and carried out at a high technical level, using modern decontamination and dismantling equipment and modern methods to ensure work safety at the Bochvar Institute site in the city of Moscow.

MIMU Parameter Identification for Large Misalignment Angles Based on AFSA

High precision calibration of Micro inertial measurement unit (MIMU) for large installation misalignment can improve the instrument and the practical use of the system precision. It can use high precision turntable to get the coarse value of installation misalignment angle as the optimization initial value, and take the standard deviation of turntable angular rate and the acceleration of gravity as the optimum index to find MIMU misalignment parameters using artificial fish swarm algorithm. Simulation and analysis are carried out based on the position and rate experiment. In addition, static navigation test is taken by using self-developed MEMS heading and attitude measurement system. Both the simulation and experimental results show that this method can improve the calibration accuracy of MIMU effectively with reduced of heading and attitude error.

Clean Factories

If you ask a child to draw a factory, you’ll most likely see a picture of huge chimneys pouring out dark smoke. Adults might come up with associations like explosions, barren industrial estates, and wasted energy and raw materials. Chemical plants, with their endless pipes and weird smells, have a particularly bad name when it comes to damaging our soil and atmosphere. Chemistry today is—we have to admit—far from ideal. Many of the industry’s perceived sins relate directly to its gigantic size. You only have to look at our power stations or the factories that produce our plastics: They’re growing bigger all the time. They often need huge cooling installations to get rid of all the excess heat. This is just another way of saying that they use far too much energy. Bigger plants bring bigger dangers. Things can go very badly in a large installation. The repercussions of an accident can be dramatic, which is why safety is such a key feature when designing them. But that imposes restrictions on the installation’s operations. It often means that we have to operate the processes far from the optimum. Operators need to play it safe at the expense of additional material and energy consumption. Truckloads of by-products must be removed—often in such vast quantities that there’s hardly any useful purpose they can serve. In classic refining techniques, for instance, it’s hard to adjust the ratio between light and heavy oil products. If you need a lot of gasoline, you end up with an excess of fuel oil, or vice versa. Increased scale has long been the chemical industry’s watchword and for compelling technical and financial reasons. A large vessel, for instance, is easier to insulate than a small one. There are other arguments in favor of large scale: Investment costs, personnel levels, maintenance, administrative costs, and land use have all traditionally been lower per unit of product in a big plant. Until recently, it’s always been an issue of bigger meaning more efficient and cheaper. Nowadays, however, the classic approach is incresingly unnecessary.

Energy Separation in Vortex Tubes with a Divergent Chamber

The vortex tube is a simple device for separating a compressed gaseous fluid stream into two flows of high and low temperature. In order to produce a high temperature separation effect, the use of a sufficiently long tube with a smooth inner surface has been standard procedure up until now. However, since such a device requires a large installation space, an attempt was made to shorten the length of the vortex chamber without any fall in the temperature separation effect by using some divergent tubes as the vortex chamber. Experimental data obtained in these vortex chambers were compared with those in the commonly used straight vortex chambers. Observation indicates that a divergent tube with a small angle of divergence is effective in obtaining a higher temperature separation and makes possible a shortening of the chamber length.