Features

Rotary Encoders

POSITAL (Hamilton, NJ) released programmable incremental rotary encoders, enabling performance characteristics such as resolution (number of pulses per turn) and incremental pulse direction (A before B or B before A) to be...

PWM Servo Drives

ACS Motion Control (Bloomington, MN) offers the NPMPM Series of dualaxis EtherCAT NanoPWM™ pulse width modulation servo drives. When utilized with the optional 10-MHz laser encoder interface and ServoBoost™ control...

Brushless DC Motors

PITTMAN® Motors, a business unit of AMETEK Precision Motion Control (Harleysville, PA), introduced the EC042B brushless DC motor series. The high-torque-density model is designed as a general-purpose servomotor. Its NEMA 17...

Drives

NORD Gear Corp. (Waunakee, WI) offers the SK 180E drives for applications that do not utilize the scope of functionality found in frequency inverters. The drives focus on the functionality necessary for pumps and conveyor technology....

Kenneth O’Connor, Coatings Engineer, Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD

Kenneth O’Connor has worked with NASA Goddard engineers to develop a nanotextured coating with hydrophobic properties. The technology minimizes dust, liquid,...

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,...

Collaborative Robots Transform Traditional Assembly

Few production arenas are changing as quickly as small parts assembly. The electronics industry, in particular, has seen demand skyrocket past the supply of skilled labor. As conventional...

Computer and Displays Help Control and Maneuver Crew Transportation System

Space-qualified boards and subsystems Aitech Defense Systems Chatsworth, CA 888-248-3248 http://rugged.com/space-products The Boeing Company selected Aitech Defense...

CubeSat Launches With 3D-Printed Components

Windform XT 2.0 3D printing material CRP USA, LLC Mooresville, NC 704-660-0258 www.crp-usa.net A team of students from the University of Kentucky and Morehead State University developed the KySat-2...

Flight Controller Software Protects Lightweight, Flexible Aircraft

NASA Technology Since its founding in 1958, NASA has made profound contributions to aviation, including advancing our understanding of flight mechanics—the study of forces...

Using a Wide-Band Tunable Laser for Optical Filter Measurements

The concept of dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) in fiber optic communication networks gained traction when optical amplifiers became available. Able to amplify an...

Product of the Month

CD-adapco, Melville, NY, has released STAR-CCM+® v10.04 simulation software that features a new finite element-based Solid Stress Solver, enabling both computational solid mechanics and computational fluid dynamics from a...

Implementing Color Machine Vision Inspection Systems

Color provides critical information that can improve the reliability of many machine vision inspection applications and make it possible to inspect many products that cannot be inspected in...

Product of the Month: Combiner Block™

The new APC Combiner Block™ from American Photonics Co. (Sarasota, FL) replaces the first turning mirror in many CO2 laser machines to add three new capabilities: a visible alignment laser, a Half...

Quantum Cascade Laser Driver

Electronic noise from quantum cascade laser drivers has long limited the detection threshold of chemical sensors. That may no longer be a problem. Wavelength Electronics (Bozeman, MT) has introduced the QCL LAB...

Silicon Avalanche Photodiode Module

Excelitas Technologies Corp. (Waltham, MA) recently launched the new HeliX™ Silicon Avalanche Photodiode (Si APD) Module, employing its leading-edge Si APD detectors to deliver enhanced performance...

Universal Fluorescence Illumination System

The new Lumen 1600-LED from Prior Scientific (Rockland, MA) is the latest product in Prior’s expanding microscopy illumination product line. The Lumen 1600-LED offers individual control for 16...

Machine Vision Software

To meet the demands of automated visual inspections in the electronics assembly process, EVT (Karlsruhe, Germany) has developed the “ChipControl” command set for its EyeVision image processing software. ChipControl...

High-Speed Streaming Camera

AOS Technologies (Baden, Switzerland) has introduced the PROMON SCOPE G2, a portable high-speed streaming camera system that helps technicians quickly isolate problems to get ailing equipment back up and running....

Digital Binoculars

Ricoh Americas Corporation (Malvern, PA) recently unveiled the RICOH NV-10A digital binoculars, which for the first time can penetrate fog, smoke, rain, and sand to provide a crisp, clear image even at night. The RICOH NV-10A...

UV Laser

Spectra-Physics® (Santa Clara, CA), a Newport company, has introduced Talon 355-20, a high UV output power addition to its Talon family of Q-switched diode-pumped solidstate (DPSS) lasers. The new laser delivers >20 W UV power,...

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 of...

Reasons for Turning to Slotless DC Motor Technology

When first introduced, brushless DC motors, despite their many advantages, were cast as a costly alternative to brush-commutated motors, and were typically only specified for low-power...

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...

Hamburg Airport Relies on Drive Technology to Keep Bags Moving

Hamburg Airport in Germany handles nine million pieces of baggage every year. For the baggage handling staff, the reliability of the conveyor system and the prevention of faults are...

Brushless Electric Motor

maxon precision motors (Fall River, MA) offers the EC-4pole 30 brushless DC motor that features two pole pairs, and provides a nominal torque of 106 mNm and an output of 150 W. It has a hermetically sealed rotor to...

Variable Frequency Drive

Mitsubishi Electric Automation (Vernon Hills, IL) introduces the F800 Series variable frequency drive (VFD) for precise motor speed control. The low-voltage motor is designed to improve efficiency of air movement...

Conveyor Drive

The NORD Screw Conveyor Package from NORD Gear Corp. (Waunakee, WI) offers closely stepped speed reduction ratios and a directly coupled gearmotor or NEMA C-face input design that eliminates the need for top motor mounts,...

Motor Brakes

X-Small motor brakes from Warner Electric (South Beloit, IL) are spring-set holding brakes for applications in industries such as aerospace and medical equipment. The electrically released brakes are designed for engaged/disengaged...