Pravin Mehta explores energy-efficient technologies and avenues that could mitigate, and perhaps solve, Indias imminent energy crisis ....

Peter G Martin discusses the major industrial issues associated with information management and the role of service-oriented architecture The effective application and operation of industrial automation technology should be one of the most valuable investments a process manufacturer can make to improve industrial plants. Unfortunately, the number of automation projects, especially for mid-sized or....

Matthias Keck provides insights into the critical aspects of pneumatic cylinder design and performance Air cylinders provide a suitable option for linear actuation in diverse industrial applications. However, to achieve a high level of cylinder performance at optimal costs, the design aspects must be balanced. Air or pneumatic cylinders have a large number of engineered components which need preci....

Pravin Mehta discusses the importance of compressors in pneumatic systems, and elaborates on vital design and operational parameters The recent advancements in civilisation have been driven by developments in industrial operationslargely with the help of machines. Machines, however, require a continuous energy input to achieve a driving force. This is primarily obtained through non-renewable energ....

Badrinath Belgaumkar and SR Venkatapathy discuss about the growing significance of sustainability in manufacturing industry Business transformation for manufacturing enterprises cannot happen without addressing societys needs. Today, value addition on the shop floors necessarily needs to consider the environmental issues. Manufacturing sustainability is closely linked to environment sustainability....

Masdar, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Abu Dhabi-based Mubadala investment company, has announced plans to construct the single largest solar power plant in the world. Masdar will collaborate with European firms Total and Abengoa Solar to spend a capital of $600 million on the construction of the plant, which will be located around 75 miles from the city. The power plant will use mirrors to focus t....

Johnson Controls Inc, the worlds largest manufacturer of automobile batteries, has recently announced that it will manufacture over 30 million leadacid automobile batteries in China annually. The decision has been taken because of the growing automobile market in the country and the burgeoning demand for lead-acid batteries. The company expects to achieve the targeted production volume by 2015.At....

Motoman Robotics, a frontline industrial robots manufacturing firm, has recently signed a technological collaboration agreement with Tech-Con Automation Inc (TCA), a leading industrial automation systems integrator based in Burlington, Ontario in Canada. The agreement will focus on the integration of water-jet cutting cells for the customers of Motoman Robotics in North America. Motoman uses wate....

Volkswagen AG plans to construct a new manufacturing facility in China, its tenth in the country. The facility will be built in Foshan city in the Guangdong Province under FAW-Volkswagen, a joint venture firm among First Automobile Works Group, Volkswagen AG, Audi AG and Volkswagen Automobile Investment Company. The new facility will cover an area of 170 acres, and is expected to be operational b....

Lockheed Martin, a globally renowned advanced technology and services firm, has awarded MAG Industrial Automation Systems a purchase and procurement order. The order is worth around $7 million. MAG Industrial Automation will supply Lockheed Martin with two six-axis CNC-controlled auto drill systems. Lockheed has chosen MAG considering its successful delivery of projects and the precision of its e....

American Superconductor Corporation (AMSC), a renowned power technologies firm, announced plans to expand its strategic collaboration with Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) Co Ltd. According to the renewed norms of the alliance, a 5MW full conversion wind turbine will be developed by HHI and AMSC Windtec, a wholly-owned subsidiary of AMSC.The wind turbine development project will begin by the end of....

Samsung Electronics has planned to expand its semiconductor facility in Austin, Texas. The company will reportedly invest a sum of $3.6 billion in the manufacturing facility which is its only unit located outside South Korea. The project will accomplish the companys second phase of building a 2.3-million-square-foot semiconductor facility along with constructing a new RD facility and creating 500....

Chrysler Group LLC plans to upgrade the manufacturing capabilities of two of its facilities in Indiana. The company will invest capital of $300 million to build a new eight-speed automatic transmission system, improving its fuel efficiency while safeguarding 1,200 manufacturing jobs. Production at the companys Kokomo casting and transmission facility will commence in 2013. The products manufactur....

Autodesk recently announced a new range of 2D and 3D design and engineering software for the manufacturing industry. Bundled under Autodesk Digital Prototyping, the software package will enable digital designing, visualisation and simulation of products before their actual manufacture. As per the officially shared information, Autodesk has improved its existing design and visualisation software r....

Corsair, a renowned developer and supplier of PC gaming hardware, has announced a new range of high-performance computer cases.Marketed as the Graphite Series 600T, the product range offers mid-tower cases as an extension of the companys highly-applauded range of highperformance computer cases. The series has been developed on the design specifications of the existing Obsidian Series 700D and 800....

Hass Automation, a firm based in the US, has developed a highspeed drill and tap machine with innovative design features. Officially christened the DT-1, the machine has a compact design with full milling capabilities, and a spacious 20 x 16 x 15.5 work cube and 26 x 15T-slot table. The machine can perform tapping at a speed of 5,000 rpm due to its highperformance BT-30 taper spindle, with a top ....

Bajaj Auto Ltd, a leading Indian automaker, has recently launched a new model of its Discover range of bikes in the Indian market. It is the first time that the company has launched the series in the 150cc engine capacity. The bike has been fitted with a new 150cc DTS engine which generates 13ps@7500 rpm. The maximum torque generation capacity of the bike is 12.75 Nm@5500 rpm, and has been redesi....

Nokia has recently launched its new range of 3G-enabled handsets in Indian markets. Commercially named the E52, 6700 Slide and 7230, the handsets work with Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS)/3G networks and have built-in social networking features.The E52 model is an E-Series smartphone, which will succeed the Nokia E51 model in Indian markets. It has a sleek design with attractive ....

Seagate, a leading storage media manufacturer, has launched a new range of external hard disk drives (HDD) with a range of innovative features. Commercially released as GoFlex, the new HDD range offers external storage devices in storage capacities that range from 320GB to 2TB. The GoFlex range is compatible with both PCs and Macs, and can be simultaneously connected or switched across both the w....

Yapp Zoom Automotive Systems Pvt Ltd has recently opened a new plastic fuel tank manufacturing unit in Chennai. The company, a joint venture firm owned by Yangzhoubased Yapp Automotive Parts Co Ltd and Mumbais Zoom Developers Pvt Ltd, had invested around Rs 60 crore in setting up the facility. The official specifications on the facility, it has an annual capacity of manufacturing 250,000 plastic ....

Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India (HMSI) recently announced the construction of a new two-wheeler manufacturing unit in Tapukara, Rajasthan. The plant will be constructed in the Tapukara Industrial Area on a 240,000-squaremetre plot. HMSI plans an estimated Rs 5 billion investment in the new facility, and will employ a workforce of around 3,000 people during the initial production stage. The com....

Doosan Heavy Industries and Construction Co Ltd plans to construct a power equipment manufacturing unit in India. The company will not collaborate with any Indian firm, setting up the facility as its wholly-owned subsidiary. The cost for the project has been estimated to be in the range of Rs 2,000 crore to Rs 4,000 crore. The establishment of such standalone wholly-owned units in India has been ....

Bharat Forge Ltd, a machine components manufacturing and supplying firm in Pune, recently signed an agreement with KPIT Cummins Infosystems Ltd, an engineering and IT consulting firm in the automotive and manufacturing domain. The agreement aims at establishing a joint venture which will focus on manufacturing and selling a new hybrid technology for automotives.The technology, known as Revolo, wi....

McNally Bharat Engineering Company Ltd, a leading engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor in the power, steel, material handling and non-ferrous sector, has procured new engineering contracts from NTPC-BHEL Power Projects Pvt Ltd, Tripura. McNally Bharat Engineering Company Ltd will provide a service package for a demineralised (DM) water system for a 2 X 363.3 MW power plant. ....

Asenior-level delegation from the Ministry of Information Technology, India, visited Taiwan to explore the possibilities of cooperation between the IT industries of India and Taiwan. The visit, which took place from May 31, 2010 to June 3, 2010, also focused on promoting Taiwanese investments in the Indian IT hardware manufacturing sector. As part of its strategy to understand the future plans of....

Ashok Leyland and Nissan Motor Company recently announced a joint venture to manufacture and sell a new range of light commercial vehicles (LCVs) in India. The LCV range will feature three new vehicles, of which two will be manufactured and launched at Ashok Leylands facility in Hosur, while the third model will be manufactured at Nissans facility at Oragadam in Chennai. The companies decided on ....

Also called pedestal drill, it is a fixed drill that can be mounted on a stand or grouted to the floor. It has five basic partsbase, column, table, spindle and induction-motor-driven drill head. A drill press usually comprises three sets of handles which are connected to a central hub. This hub facilitates the motion of the spindle and chuck around a vertical axis. The height of the table attache....

It is an electrical switch which is operated with the help of a magnetic field.The switch comprises a pair of ferrous metal reeds that are hermetically sealed in a tubular glass envelope. Due to the use of ferrous metal, the reeds are magnetisable, and thus respond to externally applied magnetic fields. The reeds are also flexible, and their ends are separated by a small gap when the switch is in....

It is a highly innovative device to measure fluid levels and can be used with both small and large tanks. It comprises a guide pipe manufactured from stainless steel (SS) 304 or SS 316 type and a magnetic float made from SS 316. The magnetic float moves inside the pipe with changes in the liquid level. Suitable for diesel and furnace oil tanks, vending machines, pumping stations, water tanks, etc....

A choke is basically an inductor which blocks high-frequency electric current (AC) in an electrical circuit, while allowing lowfrequency currents (DC) to pass through it. Chokes have found application in radio circuits, mainly to prevent electromagnetic interference and radio frequency interference from power supply lines. The device plays a major role in the prevention of malfunctions in electro....

It is a machining tool which is used to make dimensionally accurate holes and improve the quality of the surface finish. In the modern industrial scenario, reamers have found application in a wide range of machining operations, either as hand tools or as spindles with machine tools, such as with milling machines. The tool consists of a set of parallel or helically-cut edges along its longitudinal....

These are automated machines which perform uniform spraying of paint or powder on moving objects through precise and smooth up-anddown movement of guns at certain defined speeds. The spraying guns are mounted on an arm extended from a carriage and are programmed to swivel to the required stroke lengths and speeds. These depend on the object and the linear speed of the object. A carriage is moved ....

It is industrial drying equipment which is ideal for use when air at very low dew point is required. In a heatreactivated design, the desiccant is regenerated at high temperature with little dry air purging. Air at a lower dew point is obtained due to dry air purging and subsequent thermal regeneration, which lowers the content of moisture absorbed by the desiccant.Such drying devices use activat....

These are compact devices which can control power factor strictly in accordance with the load parameters.The device is inbuilt with a self-calibration functionality to calibrate the power factor and the frequency of current. A 3-mm LED provided with the device indicates the various operations.The keyboard provided with the power factor controller is membranous, with tactile feedback interface to ....

It is primarily a rotor with blades inserted in radially-cut slots, which can be used both as a compressor or a vacuum pump. The rotor in a rotary vane compressor is mounted offset in a large housing. During the compression process, while the rotor revolves, the blades slide to and fro within the slots and simultaneously maintain contact with the outer wall of the housing. In this manner, a serie....

A DGA is used to analyse the gas dissolved in transformer oil with the help of a special-purpose gas extraction unit. This removes gas from transformer oil by stirring the oil under vacuum. During the process, a temperature range of 80C is maintained, while a magnetic stirrer is used to stir the oil from which gas needs to be extracted. DGAs consist of a flame ionisation detector (FID) and therma....

SP Garnaik discusses infrared thermographya versatile technology for condition monitoring and energy conservation Temperature is one of the
most important parameters
in analysing and assessing
the condition of a material and its
important properties. A qualitative,
yet accurate conclusion for a
material condition can be drawn by
analysing the temperature profile
of its surface. For example....

Uday D Kale and Rajesh Lad provide an insight into the issues associated with operating electrical networks and discuss the benefits of integrated GIS solutions A typical power system consists of generation, transmission and distribution elements, and covers a huge network with a range of equipment, feeders and facilities. To efficiently manage utility operations, disparate systems with unique rol....

Pravin Mehta explores the current scenario in the Indian hydraulics and pneumatics market and analyses the market dynamics after the entry of foreign players The significance of fluid power in the modern industrial scenario can be easily understood if we consider the role that fluid-actuated equipment plays in the Indian market and economy. Virtually every major sector and industry has shown incre....

BK Sathish discusses the importance of engineering and design outsourcing, and highlights the critical aspects of engineering outsourcing strategies In the current scenario, as trade boundaries disappear, emerging markets and developing countries are becoming increasingly important to manufacturersboth for selling products, as well as sourcing components and services.The key for any company is....