Optimizing 5G Fiber Optic Filament Production

Ball screws are helping manufacturers meet the growing demand for fiber optic cables generated by 5G communications.

5 Ws Of LEDs for 3D Metal Printing

In the operating room, you can produce bioresorbable metal implants, such as screws for bone fractures.

Implementing Anti-Rotational Guidance for Stepper Motor Linear Actuators

Integrating lead screws with stepper motors is a simple and cost-effective method for getting precise linear motion. But achieving that precision requires...

Sample Holder for Evaluating Thin Film Sensor Materials in Gaseous Environments

Thin film gas sensors are small, lightweight, and relatively easy to operate; however, the testing of these thin film gas sensors is difficult in harsh...

Inch vs. Metric Ball Screws: Are You Asking the Right Questions?

Because ball screws are available in both inch and metric dimensions, designers sometimes begin the specification process by selecting a product family based on the unit of...

Ruggedization of Imaging Lenses

Imaging lenses used in many industrial machine vision applications have special requirements beyond those of standard imaging lenses. The lenses used in factory automation, robotics, and industrial inspection...

Sizing and Selecting Linear Motion Systems

Virtually all manufacturing processes incorporate some type of linear motion. A common mistake that designers make when sizing and selecting linear motion systems is to overlook critical application...

Novel Threading Enables New Approach to Golf Clubs

Spinoff is NASA's annual publication featuring successfully commercialized NASA technology. This commercialization has contributed to the development of products and services in the fields...

Designing Stronger Concrete

Plasticity at small scales boosts concrete's utility as the world's most-used material by letting it constantly adjust to stress, decades or centuries after hardening. To find out why, Rice University researchers...

The Basics of Encoder Selection

Positioning: Resolution and Accuracy

An application’s required positioning resolution dictates the choice of encoder resolution. A well-tuned system can maintain the position within one encoder state...

Film Cooled Surface

Turbine film cooling flows typically are subject to jet detachment and reduced cooling effectiveness for high blowing rates. Current concepts to improve jet attachment involve impractical or overly complex hole designs...

A Structural Joint with Multi-Axis Load Carrying Capacity

NASA’s Langley Research Center has developed a composite joint connector that is more structurally efficient than joints currently on the market. Traditionally, composite joints can...

Advantages of Servo Motor and Direct Drive Technology

For many years, stepper motors have been the most popular type of electric motor designed into instrumentation for a wide variety of reasons. Stepper motors have become increasingly...

Products of Tomorrow

The technologies NASA develops don’t just blast off into space. They also improve our lives here on Earth. Life-saving search-and-rescue tools, implantable medical devices, advances in commercial aircraft safety,...

Service Robots Use Flat Motors to Provide Reliable, Safe Motion

Unlike industrial robots for manufacturing, service robots come with their own specification requirements aimed specifically at the end user, and the most discriminating user at...

Motion Solutions for Electric Expansion Valves

Expansion valves are flow-restricting devices present in any refrigeration system. The valve needle remains open during steady state of operation. The size of the opening, or position of the...

Choosing the Right Drive Technology

Although there are a number of variations of drive technologies for motion applications, there are a few that are used for the majority of systems being built today. These most common drives do take a bit...

Specifying Actuators for Cleanroom Environments

Selecting the right actuator for use in any manufacturing operation involves a host of application-specific variables, including aspects such as the required stroke length, load capacity,...

LED Spot Lamp

DELO (Windach, Germany) now offers a new, high-intensity LED spot lamp with a wavelength of 400 nm. The DELOLUX 50 allows for fast, reliable, pinpoint curing of adhesive layers with thicknesses up to 10 mm, making it suitable...

Reliable Locking in High-Vibration Environments

Today’s PCB plug-in connectors must accommodate many trends, including increasing miniaturization, rising levels of performance of electronic components, and growing complexity in machine...

Shape-Memory-Alloy-Based Launch Lock

Most NASA missions require the use of a launch lock for securing moving components during the launch or securing the payload before release. A launch lock is used to prevent unwanted motion and secure the...

Liquid Cooling Technology for LEDs

Best quality LED A-lamp light bulbs provide a superior, energy-efficient alternative to incandescent bulbs, which have essentially been banned as of January 1, 2014. LED bulbs offer the same amount of light...

Reconfigurable Structural Joint

This technique allows for rapid joining of reconfigurable structures. Currently, permanent structural joints are made in factory settings or in situ. However, reconfigurable structures require appropriate...

120/240 VAC Panel Mount LEDs

Wilbrecht LEDCO (St. Paul, MN), has introduced new bipolar LEDs. The pre-wired assembly of a red, green or yellow bipolar LED and a resistor will work directly off a 120 VAC or 240 VAC line as a LED power...