Electric Vehicles and Electric Motors

A friend of mine finally got delivery of a Tesla Roadster.  This prompted discussion of the drive train and the fact that Tesla has had to go from two speed transmissions which were failing to a transmissionless drive train.  The ultimate mechatronic challenge, the electric car, is also a challenger in terms of the precise  application of electric motor technology.

But it has to be said that the motor and drive solution for the electric car is not where the problem has to be solved.  Any motor can be made to run an electric car.  What is critical is how you apply it.  The starting conditions require high torque at low speed and the running conditions require low torque at high speed.  So, typically, what looks like a small 5 to 15 horsepower running requirement at full speed, becomes a 150 horsepower starting requirement depending on how quickly you would like to start.  If you want to keep up with a Corvette, it uses 450 HP to start.

And this produces a lot of confusion.  Why not use at 2 speed transmission to help the situation.  Fine, but the ones that are available can’t handle the dynamic response of the electric motor.

Can electronics help this situation?  Interestingly, yes.  There is a control algorithm generally called vector control which allows you to manage the rotor torque and stator torque separately.  By varying the phase angle between the two, like advancing and retarding the timing of a mechanical distributor cap on an internal combustion engine, you get different speed torque curves out of the motor.  COOL!  Is there any downside to this?

Yes.  You need more current to produce more torque.  That doesn’t change.  So you have to be able to supply the current, and you have to be able to manage the heat.  The heat is transitory since you only need the high current during starting, but it is best to have sophisticated software running to keep track of the RMS temperature of the motor.  Lower operating temperatures mean longer life and reduced risk of demagnetizing the motor.

So, yes, you can run an electric car with a garden variety AC motor, and with good electronics, you can make it run fairly efficiently.  With higher efficiency motors, the benefit is increased driving range from a given power source.  High efficiency motors are frequently smaller and lighter weigh, but a weight savings in the motor of 50 or even 100 pounds is not that big a factor in the driving range when the curb weight of the vehicle is 3000 pounds.

Basically, its F=ma.  If you can reduce the mass of the vehicle, you reduce the battery payload required to power the car.  Aluminum space frames, like on the Prowler, have been studied by the car industry and can reduce curb weight by 400 pounds and reduce cost by 10% at the same time.  We need to bring all the mechatronic leverage to the situation that we can, if we are going to make electric cars that make sense.  Before its too late for Detroit.

Mechatronic Top Ten – Hard Disk Drives

One of the mechatronic Top Ten applications has to be the hard disk drive.  Strangely, it is not an application that you hear much about.  That’s probably because unless you work on hard disk drive design, you pretty much take for granted that little black box that stores all your information. So the group that is actually pushing the design frontier of hard disk drive technology is a very finite group.  There are only a dozen companies actually making disk drives these days, after consolidation in the market has resulted from acquisitions and mergers over the last decade.

Worldwide consumption of hard disk drives is in the tens of millions per year, and like all things electronic and high volume, the industry produces ever more memory at ever lower prices.  The absolute value of hard disk technology is one of the most incredible bargains in the world.  The current state of the art is about 10 cents per gigabyte which is quite a bargain compared to the 1.5 Megabytes for the old 3.5″ mini floppy disk.  With seek times in the low milliseconds, memory is almost instantly available due to 7200 RPM platter speeds.  The 7200 RPM speed is the equivalent of 75 miles per hour at the edge of the platter.  Higher speeds have been delivered, but the thin aluminum platter is subject to “flutter” which can cause a head crash.

The spindle motor is a 3 phase dc brushless motor that is designed to accelerate the memory platter to the 7200 RPM running speed in just 2 or 3 milliseconds.  This is an incredible feat considering that the power available is limited to a small lithium battery.  Further, the spindle motor must coordinate it’s motion with a linear actuator to place the drive’s read head a few millionths of an inch above the platter surface at the exact target sector on the disk.  So, just getting the platter to spin, which is hard enough given the time constraints, is further complicated by the extreme challenge of coordinating the rotational motion with the linear motion of the read head.

What makes this all even more astounding is that the budget for the motor can only be a few dollars, given a retail selling price of $60 for the whole package including the memory.  I don’t know how these guys come up with the solutions, but they consistently do and they consistently do it at lower prices.  The last thing I remember reading about was the elimination of bearings in favor of fluidized bearings.  At 60 million units, saving money on bearings adds up to a lot of money.

One of the many ironies of the hard disk drive is that it is at the root of many improvements in industrial motion control.  The venerable 33035 controller chip from Motorola was developed specifically to run hard disk drives.  It later appeared in a number of industrial servo amplifier designs delivering precise control of higher current power to a variety of brushless dc servo motors.

You never know where the breakthroughs are going to come from, but we keep them coming.  Keep up the good work!

Top 10 Mechatronic Challenges

I recently wrote on the mechatronic challenge of wind power.  Converting wind into mechanical power that can be harnessed for man’s use has been going on since the 9th Century according to Persian historians.  Certainly wind powered grinding of grains has been around in Europe for several centuries and, lest we forget, wind power pumping of water in the United States.  So there is some irony to the cultural “buzz” about wind power at home and abroad, as if the technology were entirely new.  There’s a lot of history, we’re just updating the technology to produce energy in the age of electricity.

Water has been used for power generation as well.  Following a similar path, we learned during the early part of the industrial revolution how to locate manufacturing plants near waterways so we could convert water flow into mechanical power using the water wheel.  This is, in fact the root of all modern motion control.  All the belts and pulleys, cams, gear reduction systems follow from the work done in mechanical engineering from this period of time.  All of the electronic analogs of the mechanical behaviors found in mechanical systems are the functions which we refer to in mechatronics today.

Wind power and water power gave way in the 1800’s to steam power as the improved steam engine of Watt became the standard of energy efficiency, or should I say “cost effectiveness”.  Because the absolute value of technology is in its cost effectiveness.

Still, wind energy poses a huge technology challenge, as witnessed by the number of vairations that exist and new versions that are emerging.  And hopefully improvements will continue to come from the creativity and  imagination of engineers and inventors all over the world.

But what are the other big mechatronic challenges that come to mind?

Transportation certainly ranks in the top 10.  We have seen hydraulic, pneumatic and electric vehicle solutions touted for a variety of uses, personal transport, delivery vehicles etc.  Ballard Energy and General Motors have both been building hybrid and pure electric buses for city transportation systems for several years with some success.  Interestingly, the electric bus is easier to engineer, which seems unreasonable, but the bus has more interior space to put things like batteries and a methanol converter for generating hydrogen for fuel cells.

But there is a great lesson in what appears to be an almost chaotic string of choices in the transportation arena.  One solution will not work for all requirements.  There are many people for whom a 40 mile per day drive cycle is perfect.  The NEV, Neighborhhod Electric Vehicle, is a golf cart type solution that is rated for street usage, and because of its relatively simple performance requirements, is relatively easy to achieve and lowe cost.  As we categorize cars with greater range, the problems get more difficult, and because of the storage limitations of batteries, have only been achievable as hybrids.  But with some hybrid designs reaching 50 and 60 mpg (estimated), these vehicles may be great solutions for other users.  Although, we must consider their cost effectiveness.  If they cannot be introduced at prices well below $50,000 the absolute value of the technology is not very good.

So forget the 15 second soundbyte that will solve the world’s problems.  It doesn’t presently exist.

I would like to hear from any readers about their picks for the Top Ten Mechatronic Challenge.

Linear Motion

Electric motors are generally rotating machines.  And over the roughly 100 years of electric motor history, incredible effort has been put into adapting the technology to do an almost infiinite array of tasks.  Which is why it’s kind of ironic that in the industrial world, a significant number of applications require the conversion of rotary motion to linear motion.  And, as with all things mechatronic, there are a variety of ways to solve the problem.

Most often, the first order of business is to couple the motor to a linear mechanism.  The two most common are screw type actuators and belt drives.  Both work well, both have relative strengths and weaknesses.  Screws are very smooth and provide mechanical advantage like a gear reducer, but can add inertia mass and have acceleration limits.  Belts are low mass and high speed but a stiff support system to permit proper tensioning.

Linear motion is generally about position, which is fundamentally a different behavior for electric motors. Most motors rotate at high speed, like an 1800 rpm ac motor.  So positioning implies a whole range of properties that are not easily achieved.  While we have achieved a wide variety of solutions for positioning, they are generally much more expensive and complex.  Stepping motors are the  only branch of electric motor technology where position is an inherent aspect of the motor’s operation.  And this fact has made them very popular, especially when linear motion is required.  A typical stepping motor solution is based on a 200 step per revolution motor and a 5:1 pitch lead screw.  This makes the linear motion .001″ of travel per step.  Simple, cost effective.

In many linear motion applications the top priority to is accuracy.  And when the accuracy requirement is higher precision than .001″ or the speeds required are beyond what stepping motors can produce, then other options must be explored.

Linear motors are outstanding in overall performance.  Acceleration, speed and accuracy are excellent and are the way to go where the costs are acceptable.  They use high resolution (generally millionths of an inch) tape scale linear position feedback to achieve the precise positioning required by semiconductor applications.  And this was the early field of use of linear motors.  Once considered an “exotic” solution and very expensive and difficult to apply, the last few years have seen cost improvement and a wider range of applications for the technology.

An emerging technology for linear motion is the piezoelectric motor.  Linear piezoelectric motors are available from a few suppliers and the simplicity and cost effective of this solution is making them an excellent choice for some linear motion requirements.

Most mechatronic solutions for linear motion depend on a feedback sensor to achieve position accuracy.  This makes the linear position sensor a critical component in the design of linear motion systems which I will address in the next post.  There are a number of options and some new technologies available to give designers more choices.

Mechatronics on the Trail of Global Warming

By Donna Sandfox

Omron Electronic Components, LLC

A new highly portable mechatronic system to measure harmful pollutant relies significantly on a MEMS flow sensor

Figure 1. Stationary Aethalometers are used throughout the world, but have been too heavy to be truly portable until now.

Carbon dioxide is well known as a major contributor to global warming, and there are many ways to detect and measure it. But it is not the only culprit. Scientist have found that the second most significant contributor is soot, or black carbon. Not only does black carbon contribute to environmental degradation, but these tiny particles also cut short the lives of seniors and sicken children. A recent economic impact study in California’s San Joaquin Valley (The Benefits of Meeting Federal Clean Air Standards in the South Coast and San Joaquin Valley Air Basins, November 2008) has identified the cost of air pollution and estimated it at more than $1,600 per person per year.

Black carbon doesn’t stay in the atmosphere as long as carbon dioxide, so controlling it has the potential to achieve major benefits in the short -term. Some of the major emitters of black carbon are diesel engines plus wood- and coal- burning fires. However, to analytically determine the source of black carbon and recommend effective changes to correct the problem, scientists require instruments capable of measuring black carbon in the field.

Manufactured by Magee Scientific of Berkeley, CA, the Aethalometer, is an instrument that uses optical analysis to determine the mass concentration of black- carbon particles collected from an air stream passing through a filter. However, until recently, these instruments were too large and bulky to be easily moved to a suspected point of origination for black carbon; the smallest device (the AE42) weighed approximately 25 lbs and measured 11 x 12 x 8 in. The instruments collect data from installations located around the world (Figure 1), but these only give scientists local samplings.

To get a complete picture of the black-carbon problem, scientists required a very small portable Aethalometer to easily determine black- carbon readings in almost any location. A reduction in size required some clever engineering and component sourcing.

Figure 2. The AE51 Aethalometer’s designers took advantage of the flow sensor’s port placement by designing the manifold to interface to them directly without tubing.

Aethalometer operation

Aethalometers function by measuring the amount of particulate deposited on a fiber filter by a specific amount of air passing through the filter for a predetermined amount of time. This mechatronic system needed to incorporate mechanics, electronics, and computing in one compact package. One of the major size reduction obstacles to overcome was finding a small, lightweight, highly accurate flow sensor with low power consumption. Having worked with Omron in the past, the engineers from Magee Scientific again called on Omron for a solution to their requirements, and the company recommended its D6F-P MEMS mass flow sensor for gathering the required air samples.

Figure 3. D6F-P flow sensors are individually calibrated before shipping to deliver excellent repeatability results.

Size and power constraints

The body of the D6F-P measures just 10 mm high by 23.3 mm wide by 27.2 mm deep, and with a weight of just 8.4 grams, it fell within the size and weight restraints set forth by Magee. Designed for easy installation, the D6F-P has both the input and output ports on the same side which facilitates the connection of tubing.

Magee engineers made clever use of this feature, designing their new AE51 Aethalometer so that the sensor ports would mate directly to their manifold, without the need for tubing (Figure 2). Since this miniature Aethalometer was to be battery powered, current consumption was a concern. The D6F-P proved to be very efficient, drawing a maximum of only 15 mA while operating on 5 Vdc.

Accuracy and repeatability

The AE51 relies on calculating the exact amount of air, driven by a blower incorporated in the device for a given time. Therefore the flow sensor would have to be very accurate. The D6F-P’s flow range/ pressure range of +1.0SLM (+0.84 in H2O) with an accuracy of ±5% F.S. maximum and ±2% F.S.

typical would deliver the precise flow readings Magee required to obtain reliable measurements.

Additionally, since the sensors are individually pre-calibrated at the factory for high repeatability, Magee Scientific’s finished device adjustment and test time was kept to a minimum (Figure.3). Durability was also a concern since the AE51 would have to take multiple readings, but the sensor’s MEMS technology has been proven to deliver a long life with excellent repeatability.

Figure 4. A patented dust segregation system with dual centrifugal separators ensures that the sensing chip remains clean.

In the real world

Since the AE51 is designed to measure black- carbon particulate in areas of known high concentration rates, the sensor had to be reliable in these dirty, real- world environments. Measurements would need to be taken at busy traffic intersections, bus stops, industrial sites, and coal-burning power plants.

The AE51 would also be used in remote areas of the world where use of wood fires to cook and heat is common. Although the filter used to measure the density of the black carbon is in front of the sensor’s inlet, if any particles that got past were to effect sensor operation, measurement accuracy would be compromised.

Figure 5. The reduced size of the hand-held AE51 is obvious when compared to the rack mount AE22 Aethalometer behind it.

To prevent that occurrence, the D6F-P design uses a patented dust segregation system (DSS). The DSS in the flow path incorporates dual centrifugal chambers, in which particulate matter follows in the outer path away from the MEMS sensor chip regardless of the flow direction. Thus there is practically no degradation in sensor performance over the lifetime of the system.

Keeping the MEMS sensor chip clean lets Magee guarantee a long life for their Aethalometer without worry about black-carbon build- up harming the device’s performance (Figure 4).

The A51 Aethalometer (Figure 5) is so small that it can be strapped to a user’s belt, enabling the user to become the instrument’s legs and freeing the user to do other work while the meter is gathering information. It can also be tethered to weather balloons for upper atmosphere readings. Another potential application would allow the device to be carried by those whose health might be affected most by inhaling large amounts of black carbon. The AE51 would alert them to areas that have high concentrations of this toxic material.

Omron Electronic Components, LLC

www.components.omron.com

Mechatronics and Ignorance

By Richard Comerford,
Editor
Electronic Products

I wish I had a dollar for each time I asked an EE about the use of mechatronics for a development project and got the response, “What’s that?”  And I’m not just talking about IC designers, but about people involved with designing electromechanical systems like disk drives, as well as those who are responsible for developing everything from MEMS to pick-and-place robots.

I find the lack of recognition among the electronics community a bit disheartening. Mechatronics has been around now for several decades, and many universities are now offering courses taught by professors who are dedicated to the discipline. Yet mechatronics has nowhere near the recognition of, say, electronics, or robotics, or bionics, or even hydroponics.

I suppose there may be several reasons for that situation. For one thing, people had actually been using electronic controls for mechanical systems long before the term mechatronics was coined. Things like automatic doors and air conditioners have been around for a long time, as has the pop-up toaster, all of which are examples of simple mechatronic systems.

Robots have been a part of the popular culture for so long that people don’t typically associate them with mechatronics. The discipline of building robots — robotics, which is actually a subset of the field of mechatronics — also predates mechatronics. So everyone thinks they know what you mean when you say “robot,” but I wonder what would happen if you tried dropping “mechatron” into
a conversation.

Another reason for the relative obscurity among EEs of mechatronics may be political. Sometimes, getting engineers from different disciplines to work together is like trying to get the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force to agree on who has the best football team.  As an EE, I can remember how in college we used to disparage civil engineers as “road crew,” mechanical engineers as “gear heads,” and chemical engineers as “stink bombs,” knowing with the certainty of youth that only those who could command the electron to do their bidding were masters of the universe.

I doubt that even today there are many computer scientists or electronics engineers who would be happy to admit that mechanical design is equally as important as their disciplines. And for them to relearn their approach to design with a broader set of tools is by no means an easy process.

Nonetheless, areas that hold the most promise for advancement in the future — such things as haptics, MEMS, and advanced HMI — are inherently mechatronic in nature, and will require interdisciplinary knowledge for success.  Sure, mechatronics may require better PR or an agent who can sell it to Hollywood, but regardless of how successfully it is promoted to the masses, those technologists who are ignorant of it may soon find themselves not only out of touch, but also out of work.

Wind Energy and Mechatronics

By Steve Meyer,
CEO/Senior Consultant
Solid Tech Inc.

What would you put on a “Top Ten” list of the toughest mechatronic applications of all time? The electric car, plug-in or hybrid is certainly on the list.

One application that needs to be on the list is the Wind Turbine. It is a mechatronic challenge because it combines the aerodynamics of rotor design, the mechanics of a gear reduction system, the electromagnetics of an electric generator and the power electronics system for output power conditioning and synchronization to the utility grid system, all of which is designed in the range of 1000 to 4000 hp.

Each portion of the system must be designed in conjunction with the other systems to achieve the overall goals of efficient net power conversion.  Plus, wind turbine hardware has constraints that are different from other forms of equipment.  In addition to efficiency, another top priority of wind power turbines is life expectancy. The manufacturing constraints those priorities create are a nightmare.

Since most wind turbines sit on top of 150 ft tall masts, the systems are also weight constrained.  Other constraints include a second axis of motion that pivots the nacelle that houses the gear reducer and generator.  It can weigh more than 5 school buses. Then, the whole assembly must steer into the wind.  Sounds like fun.

The efficiency of the rotor at a variety of wind speeds is totally an aerodynamic issue. While this not my area of expertise, even with my limited background, it is clearly a problem since wind speeds vary constantly.  The consequence of this dynamic is that the rotor speed cannot be predicted.  Therefore, the electrical system must take a varying input and convert it to dc and then back to
synchronous ac, or control the speed of the rotor and waste some of the input energy.

The gear system requires large-scale, precise machining.  Not so much because there is some accuracy required in the load, but for efficiency and minimal wear.  Only a few companies in the world are able to produce these systems, and the current orders are backlogged to 2011.

Manufacturers have found that wind turbines are more cost effective the bigger they are.  This makes sense on the motor side because power increases with the square of the radius.  But it sure makes everything more difficult.  The mast and cantilever load of the turbine and propellers is huge.

But all that engineering has to be done inside a cost envelope.  According to the Danish Wind Energy group, a typical 600 kW system costs around $450,000.  Installation costs will be $135,000, making the initial cost $585,000.  If the unit produces 1,500,000 kWh hour a year at 0.05/kWh it generates $75,000 that year minus an average maintenance cost of $6,750.  At a cash flow rate of $68,250 a year, it will take 8.4 years to break even, not including discounted cash calculations.

You can play with the numbers on line at the Danish Wind Energy website.  The US utilities are regulated in how much they can get for power.  At 0.10/kWh the payback is 4.2 years.  But what if the wind estimates are too high?  That’s a lot of money.

The public policy question is how much government funding is going in to this arena?  Is the Federal or State government offering subsidies to facilitate the adoption of the technology?  If so, shouldn’t we be getting a discount on our electric bill if taxpayer money is used?

Footnote: The Global Wind Energy Council in Brussels reports that installed capacity for wind power worldwide was up 28.8% last year with the US increasing its base by over 50% and edging out Germany as the leading user of wind power in the world.  Interestingly, China, often accused of being one of the most environmentally irresponsible countries, is the No. 4 user of wind power in terms of installed base with similar growth over last year.  Maybe some things are headed in the right direction.

Materials and Motion

Most motor sizing programs deal with time and torque analysis.  The traditional tradeoff is more torque for less time.  As an aside, the increase in electric motor torque comes with increased motor inertia, so it’s not for free.  And the motor costs are always a factor.

But this assumes that inertia is fixed.  And that’s an OK assumption as long as the assumption is made consciously.  Because, it’s only an assumption for the convenience of doing a time/torque tradeoff analysis, not reality.

The fact is that there are lots of options on inertia, whether the mechanism is new or existing.  If the parts are existing, you know what your starting parameters are.  But the real issue is to NOT ignore the options.  There’s a lot of performance bandwidth to be had by exploring materials and inertia options.

Here are some typical material properties; steels are approximately 7.86gm per cubic centimeter.  Good old steel, cheap, strong, dense.  Typical strength is 50-60kpsi without getting into the exotic alloys.   This is where most mechanical designs start because of steel’s low cost.

Machinable grades of aluminum alloys are routinely available in the 30-40kpsi range.  And the density is only 2.7gm/cubic centimeter.  Roughly one third of steel.  That means only 1/3 the inertia.  And only 1/3 the amount of torque needed to achieve a given motion.  So even though aluminum costs three times as much as steel, the cost of the motor to drive the load is reduced significantly.  In addition, most machine shops can run aluminum parts twice as fast, so it costs less to machine.  A lot less.  So at the end of the day, even though we could start the comparison of steel versus aluminum at direct material cost, that comparison wouldn’t take into account all the benefits.

Then there are the engineering plastics which have gotten better over the years.  Polycarbonate, for example, has strength in the range of 10-13kpsi with density of 1.3gm per cubic centimeter.  Half the density of aluminum, good strength and very inexpensive.  So in some cases, you could use more polycarbonate volumetrically to replace aluminum and reach comparable strength requirements while reducing inertia at the same time.

This is all based on common off the shelf materials.  The  options get even more interesting when you start exploring more exotic materials.

Titanium is a great alternative to steel when high strength and light weight are required.  But it’s expensive material to buy and because it is so hard, the machine costs are typically much higher than steel.  But when you have to have it, you have to have it.  And I have had projects where we needed the inertia advantage, and the premium paid for the material made possible some applications that couldn’t have been done any other way.

A friend of mine developed a material called AlBeMet, a blend of aluminum and beryllium.  The beauty of this material is that it has the strength of titanium at the weight of aluminum, beryllium being much harder and lighter than aluminum.  Beryllium doesn’t alloy well, but that’s the part the folks at Brush Wellman were able to get done.  And the results are phenomenal.  Again, it is expensive material, but you don’t need much of it to get the job done.  And where strength and light weight is needed, this stuff is incredible.

But the real point is, keep your options open when working on mechatronic designs.

Zuken Implements Mechatronics Design Strategy and Launches New 3D Modeling Solution

Munich, Germany and Westford, MA, USA – Zuken has made another step to strengthen the link between the electronics and mechanical design worlds by enabling parallel MCAD/ECAD design with a new collaborative software tool called Board Modeler. This forms part of company-wide strategy underway to deliver increased versatility and reliability between the mechanical, electrical, and electronics design disciplines. Board Modeler docks in Zuken’s electronic systems and PCB design suite CR-5000, allowing layout and mechanical engineers to work more closely together in synchronization from as early in the process as floor planning. In this way Board Modeler gives engineers the power to rise to the challenge of integrating PCBs into ever more mechanically complex products, while saving time through parallel working and the elimination of design re-work.

Layout Engineer Gets True 3D
For the first time, with Board Modeler the layout engineer can easily work in a 3D environment modeller. The true component shape is now visible, rather than just showing items approximated as a cuboid or cylinder (2.5D). This is achieved by performing 3D conversions of footprint data, importing parts made by MCAD, or by using Zuken’s online component database, which contains over 4.5 million accurately detailed 3D components. This enables the engineer to carry out floor planning, perform collision checks between the PCB housing, components or other PCBs; all working with the true 3D component shapes. Board Modeler also eliminates duplication of effort between electronic and mechanical design by permitting the layout engineer to import board outlines, pre-placed parts and obstacles directly from mechanical CAD tools. It also automatically back-annotates any board and placement changes, as board outline and restriction areas, into the PCB design, whether new or imported, so any required layout action, like re-routing, can be done easily. Industry standard neutral file formats, including STEP, ACIS , STL and IDF, are used to bridge the gap to virtually any mechanical CAD system.

This solution is the logical step forward from Zuken’s previous tools – EM Designer and EM Checker, and improves 3D capabilities through direct integration with board design solution CR-5000 Board Designer and manufacturing board panelling solution Board Producer, allowing users to handle more complex 3D data. This smooth integration also means board layout structures, with all the material properties and electrical constraints, can be exported via Board Modeler into numerical simulation tools for mechanical, electrical or thermal verification. Simulation results can then be easily back annotated into CR-5000 tools for design modifications.

Board Modeler also features a multi-board option that allows design verification of multiple boards and chassis on a multi-site global basis.

www.zuken.com

Tips for the Control Side of Mechatronics

By Leslie Langnau, Managing Editor
Design World

In mechatronic projects, the focus is often on the mechanical and electrical aspects of a system as engineers concentrate on throughput, speeds, accuracy, and so on.  How these system goals affect the desired control selection may not be addressed until too late to make changes. Mechanical engineers do their part, then electrical engineers do their part, then, the controls engineers must make it all work.

In addition to finding ways to improve the communication and interaction of the various engineering disciplines, there are other design aspects that affect controls to keep in mind. Robert Muehlfellner, Director Automation Technology, B&R Industrial Automation Corp., offers a few. Read more

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