Man from Mysore Creates India’s First Electric Concept Bike Without an Engineering Degree.

An innovative mind should not be judged by the degrees it possesses, and Mysore-based Santosh has proved it. He holds a job at a pharmaceutical company to support his family. But when he is not working, he spends hours on his hobby of creating new motorbikes. He has now unveiled his latest creation, India’s first electric concept bike.

The bike is known as Nisttarkya which translates to ‘unimaginable’. It weighs 40 kg and runs on a 36 V, 350 W. The bike is juiced up by three 36 V rechargeable batteries. Santosh says that he built the bike using parts from old bikes and second-hand equipment.

From the looks of it, the design of the Nisttarkya looks like a slimmer lightcycle from the Tron movies. The rider can direct the bike using the handlebars that are placed on the front wheel. The ride position may appear weird and may also look physically taxing, but Santosh said that being a concept, the design was supposed to be ambitious. He adds that companies can take inspiration from his design and create a more user-friendly design.

It took Santosh about Rs. 60,000 to create the bike while being employeed in a full time job. He has also received mentions in the Limca Book of Records for his previous bike called the Moosshiqk which is the smallest electric bike in the world.

So if you wanted to build a dream bike of your own, but are worried that you don’t have an engineering degree, well then Santosh can be your inspiration. Go ahead and create your own Nisttarkya.

Arresting minor leak by OLS (On line sealing) clamp on pipe lines handling HC fluid

1. Firstly make attempt to temporary seal the minor leak/seepage by applying cold 5 minutes putty.

2. Carry out thorough thickness measurement by UT (Ultrasonic Testing) detector covering surface area at distance of 150 mm (minimum) from the leak spot.

3. If thickness reduction is not significant (i.e. not below the nominal thickness minus corrosion allowance),we can proceed for installing suitably designed two halves bolted clamps on leak spot with provision for injecting the furmaniting compound at pressure not above 30% of operating pressure.

4. Inject furmaniting compound as explained above.

5. This will work for 12 month with periodical top up of furmaniting compound at interval of every 3 months.

6. Normalize pipe line (i.e.remove clamp) and replace leaking pipe in next S/D opportunity for long term reliability.

Risk associated in operation of Hydro jetting machines

Most of the process industries prefer to clean the heat exchangers tube and shell by high pressure (15000 psi to 20 000 psi) hydro jetting machines. This cleaning operation is having high potential for risk of human injury if due safety measures not taken by users. Any accidental contact of water jet would cause severe injury to human being sometimes it will be fatal also. The machine itself should be adequately equipped with safety features like pressure relief valve in pumping installation; recirculation system should be reliable, high pressure flexible hose connection should have flanged connection in place of threaded connections. The machine operator should wear Mandatory PPEs besides special PVC suits covering entire body. Area of work station should be barricaded properly to ensure that no one can approach the work place area.

During temporary idling of cleaning operation, pumping system should be kept in circulation and main stream of jet should be kept off to avoid any accident.

One standby man should stand near control panel for emergency stop of the motor. He should also be in proper PPEs.

What do you think about this helicopter-plane hybrid drone, which takes off like a helicopter but flies like a plane?

Leg Exoskelton Makes Walking 7 Percent More Efficient

A new leg exoskeleton can improve the efficiency of walking by 7 percent – and do it with no power source—according to scientists at North Carolina State University who published their research today in Nature. Their creation could be a big boon for people with low mobility.

The device provides support through the carbon fiber frame and attached springs, which act as secondary muscles in the device. The spring and frame combine act as a sort of calf muscle. In doing so, they reroute energy that would normally go through a person's calf muscle and tendons. The whole thing weighs a little more than a pound, and most users were able to ignore it after about 20 minutes of use.

The device is still in the beginning stages, and won't work for running. But it's a big step toward improving the efficiency of walking, whether its for a hiker or someone who needs a boost in efficiency to save their energy.

(new) Meet Loopwheel, the First Shock-Absorbing Wheel

Don't tell British designer Sam Pearce the wheel isn't ripe for reinvention. He came up with Loopwheels, a shock-absorbing, spokeless wheel that's perfect for bikes and wheelchairs.

Pearce told Wired that the idea came to him when saw a woman forget to lift the front wheels of her stroller when it hit a curb and the baby fell out. "If the wheel hits the curb at the wrong angle it's useless," he said. "So I just wondered, why can't you put the suspension into the wheel?"

He crafted a system where the shock would be absorbed into the wheel itself, but the idea seemed like such a no-brainer that Pearce said it didn't feel "relevant," and he sat on it. Two years later and 70 iterations after, he and his team created a "carbon composite construction" wheel.

The inside of the wheel flexes and adjusts when weight is pressed on it. The coolest part is that the center of the wheel, or the hub, moves while the rim stays rigid.

Pearce has launched a successful Kickstarter campaign to roll the wheel into development. The drawback: These futuristic wheels are expensive to make. Until he figures out a more effective manufacturing process, one of them will cost you $2,000.

Happy New Year 2015 to All Mechanical Engineers.

Thermoelectric power plants could offer economically competitive renewable energy

INSIDES:—A new study predicts that large-scale power plants based on thermoelectric effects, such as small temperature differences in ocean water, could generate electricity at a lower cost than photovoltaic power plants.

Liping Liu, Associate Professor at Rutgers University, envisions that thermoelectric power plants would look like giant barges sitting in the tropical ocean, where electricity is generated by heating cold, deep water with warm, shallow water heated by the sun. Liu has published a paper in the New Journal of Physics in which he analyzes the feasibility of such power plants.

"This work is about the new idea of large-scale green power plants that make economic use of the largest accessible and sustainable energy reservoir on the earth," Liu told Phys.org , speaking of the oceans. This is because the sun heats the surface water to a temperature that, in tropical regions, is about 20 K higher than water 600 m deep. Essentially, the surface water acts as a giant storage tank of solar energy.

As Liu explains, thermoelectric power plants would work by harvesting the energy of ocean waves to pump cold water from a few hundred meters deep up through a long channel. As the cold water nears the surface, it enters a heat exchanger where it is heated by surface water on the outside. The heat exchanger acts as an electric generator, as its tubes are made of thermoelectric materials that can transfer heat through their walls and directly convert temperature differences into electricity.

Large-scale, ocean-based thermoelectric power plants would have many advantages. For one, the "fuel" or temperature differences are free, unlimited, and easily accessible. Also, the plants do not take up space on land. Because they have no moving solid parts, they would have low maintenance costs. In addition, the power output does not depend on the time of day or season. And finally, the method is green, as it does not release emissions.

Small-scale thermoelectric generators are already used commercially in applications such as microelectronics, automobiles, and power generation in remote areas. In these designs, the conversion efficiency is the most important factor because the fuel accounts for the largest portion of the cost.

Most commercial devices have a conversion efficiency of around 5% to 10% of the ideal Carnot efficiency, with state-of-the-art devices achieving efficiencies of up to 20%. Although research is currently being done to further improve the efficiency, there are still limits to how high it can go.

In the new paper, Liu shows that large-scale thermoelectric power plants wouldn't need to operate at extremely high efficiencies to be economically competitive; instead, the key would lie in engineering simple structures such as laminated composites in order to support mass production. These improvements focus on the conversion capacity, which, unlike efficiency, can be improved by orders of magnitude. In other words, because the fuel is free and in limitless supply, large-scale thermoelectric power plants could make up with their sheer size what they lack in efficiency.

The Rimac Concept_One is no everyman’s car. It is an electric supercar out of Croatia that costs a fortune as in, $1 million.

Needless to say, most of us will be lucky to even see one of these, let alone touch one, let alone ride in one, let alone own one. Still, it’s a beauty worth mentioning, and I’m hopeful it will get produced in 2015. As of now, 88 initial cars are planned for production in 2015. The Rimac Concept_One can reportedly go from 0 to 60 mph in 2.8 seconds, and has a horsepower of 1,088. Yep, that’s a “supercar.” Rimac Automobili recently landed a good bit more investment in order to produce the initial 88 cars. 

Gecko-Inspired Invention Works And Allows Humans To Cling Vertical Glass Wall Like Spider-Man.

To build the devices that enable this wall crawling ability, researchers analyzed how geckos support themselves and then improved on that already-powerful adhesive ability.

Gecko feet are covered in tiny little bristles or hairs called setae, which interact with the molecules of different surfaces to create an electric attraction called van der Waals force. This force helps the little lizards cling to vertical surfaces and even walk on some ceilings.

Part of what makes this really amazing is that the structure of these connections allows the gecko to detach and reattach their feet at will, which is the special skill that actually lets them climb up the wall and not just stick to it in one place.

At their strongest, these little hairs are able to create an insanely strong attraction. If each of the 6.5 million tiny bristles was operating at full power all the time, those little gecko feet should be able to hold up a 286-pound adult human - bigger than the average NFL defensive end .

But as Science explains , geckos can actually only lift a maximum of 4.4 pounds: The bristles on their feet can't all be used at the same time. The physical structure of the foot means that only a few small hairs can be at their stickiest at once. So on a small scale, they are incredibly powerful, but it's hard to scale up that ability to bigger and heavier objects.

A HUMAN TRICK:

Whenever humans have tried to replicate gecko climbing ability, they've run into the same problem - they can't replicate sticking power using only a tiny surface area, and it's especially difficult to create enough sticking power for something as large as a person.

But a team of engineers at Stanford figured out how to make it work.

Moveable footholds are attached to the pads, so the body weight of the climber is being supported by the adhesive pad against the wall, not by brute arm strength.

In the new contraption, the two hand pads are all that hold the climber (lead study author Elliot Hawkes in the image attached) in the attached photo. The footholds he stands on are connected to those hand pads, so that the pads themselves are holding his body weight and he doesn't have to cling to the wall using brute strength. He's actually just standing on the foot-ledges in the attached image.

Each of the two hand pads is covered by 24 small tiles. Each tile is covered in tiny silicon rubber hairs that mimic the gecko's setae, each about as tall as human hair is thick.

Those little rubber hairs, or microwedges, as they are called, can attach and detach easily without breaking down - and there's something special about their adhesive force that makes them perfect for climbing. The adhesive is designed so it becomes stickier when more force is pulling on it but it becomes less sticky if you take that force away. So by stepping on a foothold connected to a hand pad, Hawkes causes that pad to generate adhesive force and stick to the wall. To detach and climb up, he just has to take his weight off the foothold.

Types of Diodes (Engineering)

Amazing Engineering (Engineering )

A spectacular weather phenomenon due to Thermodynamics (Engineering)

A breathtaking weather phenomenon turned the Grand Canyon into a cauldron of soupy cloud cover on this Thursday.

The rare scenes were caused by a temperature inversion, which involves cold air filling the canyon while warm air lies above it, trapping the fog in place since the denser cold air hugs the ground.

See also: Mesmerizing drone video reveals a foggy Dallas from above

The result, a layer of low-lying clouds, or fog, produced the spectacular sight and turned the canyon into a sea of clouds.

(Engineering) WARD'S 10 BEST ENGINES OF 2015

Ward's 10 Best Engines is an annual list of the ten "best" automobile engines available in the U.S. market, that are selected by Ward's AutoWorld magazine. The list was started in 1994 for Model Year 1995, and has been drawn every year since then, published at the end of the preceding year.

10 Best Engines of 2015 in alphabetical order are:

• 127-kW Electric Motor (BMW i3 electric vehicle)
• 6.2L OHV V-8 (Chevrolet Corvette Stingray)
• 6.2L Supercharged OHV V-8 (Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat)
• 1.0L Turbocharged DOHC 3-cyl. (Ford Fiesta)
• 100-kW Fuel Cell (Hyundai Tucson FCV)
• 1.5L Turbocharged DOHC 3-cyl. (Mini Cooper)
• 3.0L Turbodiesel DOHC V-6 (Ram 1500 EcoDiesel)
• 2.0L Turbocharged DOHC H-4 (Subaru WRX)
• 1.8L Turbocharged DOHC 4-cyl. (Volkswagen Golf)
• 2.0L Turbocharged DOHC 4-cyl. (Volvo S60)

Zijing Qingyuan Armored Spherical Cabin Electric Patrol Vehicle developed by The Chinese company Suzhou Zijing Qingyuan for use by the riot police.(Amazing World)

AR-1000 Tidal Turbine.(Engineering)

Mechanical Inventions Meet The Robot RoboSimian (Engineering)

It is designed to extend humanity's reach, going into dangerous places such as a nuclear power plant during a disaster scenario such as we saw at Fukushima. It can take simple actions such as turning valves or flipping switches to stabilize the situation or mitigate further damage.

CAD Models. (Engineering)

NEW INVENTION MIT Develops Cheetah Robot - A Ferrari In The Robotic World (Engineering)

It's a robot unlike any other: inspired by the world's fastest land animal, controlled by video game technology and packing nifty sensors -- including one used to maneuver drones, satellites and ballistic missiles.
The robot, called the cheetah, can run on batteries at speeds of more than 10 mph, jump about 16 inches high, land safely and continue galloping for at least 15 minutes -- all while using less power than a microwave oven.

Protect your electronic device designs from thermal runaway and counterfeit batteries

Most electronic device designers are using or considering rechargeable batteries.  Cars, cellphones, laptops, media players, and even airplanes are increasingly reliant on lithium chemistry. As we’ve seen in some famous examples, if they are not engineered properly, thermal runaway in these batteries can make them very dangerous.  That’s a product performance problem you really don’t need!

Several design factors have been attributed to thermal runaway, but some result from counterfeit batteries and chargers that don’t include the requisite safety features. The engineers at Texas Instruments (TI) have looked into these causes to develop a battery platform and portable power management system to help prevent the batteries in your designs from catching fire.

Temperature Monitoring of Rechargeable Batteries

Many things can increase the chances that a battery will overheat. Some notable causes of overheating are: improper ventilation (like charging under a pillow), using the device while charging (or in extreme conditions), and using counterfeit batteries.  Thankfully, a simple thermistor can help detect when the battery is over-heating.

When a battery is being charged, a certain amount of voltage and current is being applied to the battery.  Too much current or too much voltage can create a very hot battery.  Many battery management systems will monitor only current or voltage, but TI’s bq24060 and bq24070 will monitor them both to ensure safe charging. This video shows that once the temperature reaches a safety margin, the power to the battery is shut off.

However, temperature monitoring is the last line of defense to ensure product and user safety. Designers must also ensure that authentic batteries are used and the charging is properly managed.

Authentication & Identification of Replacement Batteries

Not all consumers will listen to the warnings to use your custom made batteries and chargers.  Unfortunately, counterfeit batteries that aren’t specifically designed for a device may not supply the correct voltage and current levels while charging.

To prevent counterfeit battery use, TI has a portfolio of authentication devices that range from the basic to very complex. If the battery doesn’t pass authentication, then the device will either not start or it will send an error message during start-up.

The simplest of schemes use Identification-Based Authentication. It works somewhat like wireless authentication and identification.  A host (phone) sends a constant signal to the responder (battery) and a constant reply is sent back. The host can then read the data and verify that the battery was made for the product.  The bad news with this scheme is that the codes can be duplicated by counterfeiters, often within just weeks of production.

For added security, a challenge and response-based authentication scheme can help to confound the counterfeiters. This scheme changes the challenge and response each time the battery is inserted. The security is in a secret key that is shared between the device and the battery. When the battery is plugged in, the phone sends a set of numbers that are fed into the key. If the returned value matches the value calculated by the host, the device is powered up.

The challenge and response-based scheme also employs public authentication.  Public authentication platforms are effective because they can more thoroughly evaluate against attacks seeking to uncover the secret key.

For even more security, the SHA-1/HMAC-based (Secure Hash Algorithm-1/Hash Message Authentication Code) can be implemented. This method has been used for several years to secure internet transactions. It works similarly to the Challenge and Response scheme using a secret key.  However, this method uses a 160-bit challenge.  This creates 2160 or 1.46 x 1048 possibilities, which greatly increases security.  If you want to use this method, then TI’s bq26100 IC is right for your design.

Charging Management

As a safety feature, typical chargers place the battery and the system in parallel with each other. In this configuration, if a user is charging their battery while using the phone, less current is available to charge the battery. In some designs, if the system current is greater than the battery current, then the battery will actually start discharging. That’s why turning off GPS and Wi-Fi systems will charge your phone faster.

Other configurations manage battery charging differently. For example, the current flow Power Path Management (PPM) system uses a pair of transistors to control how much power is on the power bus and the amount of current that is applied to the battery.  This ensures a regulated amount of voltage and current are applied to the battery during the charging cycle.



Additionally, a Dynamic PPM (DPPM) will maximize the available power from the adapter by monitoring the power bus for input fluctuations. In this set up, if the battery and system current becomes greater than the current being supplied, then adjustments are made so that both receive a proper amount of current equal to what is available. Additionally, this configuration will allow your design to use a smaller power rating and a less expensive AC adapter. This DPPM set up is used in TI’s bq24070 IC.


Fuel Gauging

Has your battery gauge ever told you that you have 20 minutes of charge remaining, only to shut down 2 seconds later? Fuel gauging isn’t just for user satisfaction. It’s also important in measuring the proper battery charge.

Most devices employ either a voltage-based or the coulomb counting-based algorithm to determine the charge of your device’s battery. However, both of these algorithms have their limitations.

TI’s patented Impedance Track™ technology, however, uses both algorithms to help measure the charge and the resistance of the battery over time. Another algorithm is used to learn the behavior of the battery to better utilize the battery’s capacity.  The system then keeps a database of various characteristics of the battery. This method helps to predict the remaining battery capacity with up to 99% accuracy. TI’s bq27520-G4 uses Impedance Track technology to perform this function. The IC can also report:

battery capacity (mAh)
state-of-charge (%)
state-of-health (SOH%)
run-time to empty (min.)
voltage (mV)
temperature (°C)

Power management isn’t just for cell phones.  Whether you are dealing with power tools or eMotorcyles, portable medical monitoring devices or portable audio systems, TI’s power management system can increase the battery safety on your project. If you want to see how these design advances can impact your electronic device performance, TI has the documentation that can help get you started.