Back to the future for the 36th America’s Cup match
It’s back to the future for the 36th America’s Cup presented by PRADA in just 12 day’s time. Emirates Team New Zealand congratulates Luna Rossa on a resounding win in the Prada Cup final against INEOS TEAM UK and look forward to a rematch from the 2000 America’s Cup here in Auckland 21 years ago.
“We have been waiting and watching each of the Challengers for the past few years and now we finally know who we will be racing and who we need to beat to successfully defend the America’s Cup. We have always known Luna Rossa will be passionate, creative and strong across the board, a few of their guys were teammates last time, so we know them well and they know us.” said Emirates Team New Zealand’s Peter Burling.
“It is now just 12 days until the first race, we have been waiting years for this opportunity to race, so we are incredibly excited about the start of racing on March 6. Already you can sense the intensity has risen yet another notch internally now we know we will be racing Luna Rossa and our complete and utter focus is now zeroed in knowing that we need to be better than them across the board.”
Our respect should also be acknowledged towards INEOS TEAM UK and American Magic who both contributed a huge amount to this America’s Cup. They both proved to be brave and determined teams that will only continue to gain in strength.
maxon Group tel. +61 2 9457 7477.
maxon Group is an Official Supplier to Emirates Team New Zealand. We follow the progress of their journey as Defender in the 36th America’s Cup campaign, March 2021.
DC motor with compact right angle gearbox.
New combination of both right angle and inline gearhead fitted to DC motor with encoder.
When a compact solution is required for right angle transmission a spiroid gear is used instead of a worm gearhead. The spiroid gear offers a smaller profile than the traditional worm and wheel gearbox body. This unit consists of a 35mm brushed DC motor with and ironless rotor design that features zero cogging for smooth motion control. 105mNm of torque can be produced at 6990rpm on a 24V power supply. This is then passed through a 32mm 111:1 ceramic planetary gearhead giving 8.2Nm available which is then fed to a 4.125:1 spiroid gear with 90% efficiency. The gearhead has traditional tapped mounting holes on the front flange and also a convenient new off centreline pivot point for use in lifting actuators or for belt tensioning. The right angle drive has a robust machined construction and can be used with higher reduction ratios and with or without the intermediate planetary gear. There are a wide range of brushed and brushless motors with or without encoders. This unit depicted shows a 500cpt 3 channel optical encoder, however smaller magnetic encoders are also possible. For operation in tight spaces such as downhole oil, gas and pipe inspection robotics.
For more information contact maxon motor Australia tel. +61 2 9457 7477.
Mars landing explained.
All landings on Mars are difficult. For NASA’s Perseverance Rover, set to land on Mars on February 19, 2021 at 7.30am AEST, this one is particularly tense.
With the biggest supersonic parachute ever sent to another planet, the first helicopter drone Ingenuity onboard, the touchdown site the most challenging terrain on Mars ever attempted and with maxon DC motors onboard, this is one landing not to be missed!
Dr Carlos Bacigalupo, Astrophysicist and Head of R&D at maxon Group, Australia, talks us through the complex landing sequence. Watch the video here.
The intense Entry, Descent, and Landing phase, known as EDL, begins when the spacecraft reaches the top of Mars’ atmosphere. It takes approximately seven minutes to enter the atmosphere and land safely on the ground – and these have been referred to as the seven minutes of terror. During these nail biting minutes, the spacecraft autonomously lands itself and until the data is received that Perseverance has landed safely, this window of lagged communication is wait-and-see if the spacecraft has crashed or landed safely.
Dr Bacigalupo also takes us through the maxon brushed and brushless motors that will be used for numerous mission-critical tasks. They will power the small robotic arm in the rover moving the soil samples from station to station and for sealing and depositing the sample containers. There are also six 10mm DC micromotors used to control the tilt of the rotor blades, which determines the direction of Ingenuity’s flight.
Images courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech/ University of Arizona. With thanks to NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (California Institute of Technology), ES/DLR/FU Berlin, maxon Group, Mark Sheppard. Music from Bensound.com and zapsplat.com.
maxon motor Australia tel. +61 2 9457 7477.
maxon and Fourier Intelligence join forces to transform rehabilitation technology
maxon Group and Fourier Intelligence, who specialise in exoskeletons and robotic rehab, announce that they are entering into a global strategic partnership.
maxon’s precision DC motor and drive systems and the start-up Fourier’s Intelligence’s rehabilitation robotics are a perfect match and are expected to drive the development of new technologies for patients. Technology plays an increasingly important role in rehabilitation services and healthcare. To best meet the needs of patients; clinicians, engineers and companies recognise that they need to accelerate the development of technological solutions. This is the main goal of the partnership between DC motor specialist maxon and start-up Fourier Intelligence, which specialises in exoskeletons and robotic rehabilitation. The two companies are pooling their expertise to develop industry-leading technological products and platforms for patient treatment. To seal the partnership, a memorandum of understanding was signed in December 2020.
“The partnership between maxon and Fourier is a powerful combination,” said Eugen Elmiger, CEO maxon Group. “Fourier’s understanding of the interplay between modern rehabilitation robotics and technological products perfectly complements maxon’s philosophy of making the world a little better with our precision drive systems. Together, we will be able to generate industry-leading technology products and platforms.”
Fourier already uses brushless DC motors from maxon in its ExoMotus X2 exoskeleton. In addition, maxon will become part of the Exoskeleton & Robotics Open Platform System (EXOPS™), an open platform for research and development of exoskeleton and robotics systems. maxon will provide a variety of customised DC motor and drive solutions with motors, gearheads, encoders and controllers for ambitious engineers who want to develop robotics solutions for rehabilitation services.
“Partnering with maxon will allow us to provide the best technology portfolio on which to conceive, design and build the next generation of transformative technological products and platforms,” said Zen Koh, co-founder and deputy CEO of Fourier Intelligence. “Together, as one team, we will unlock the full potential of technological rehabilitation and put patients on the best path to recovery.”
maxon motor Australia tel. +61 2 9457 7477.
Searching for signs of life on Mars
Mars once had liquid water and an atmosphere — was there life too? To answer this vital question, NASA sends the Perseverance rover, a robot of unparalleled complexity, to explore the Red Planet. For the first time, we will see live images of a Mars landing, supplied by high-resolution video cameras.
The planned touchdown of NASA’s Perseverance Rover is February 18, 2021. Only a few craft make it to the planet’s surface intact. The European Space Agency (ESA) had a painful demonstration of that in 2016 when their lander Schiaparelli smashed into pieces on the Red Planet. Nevertheless, US space agency NASA has so far taken four robotic vehicles to Mars successfully. It is now looking to make history again with the Perseverance rover. For the first time, we on Earth will see live images of a Mars landing, supplied by high-resolution video cameras.
It will still take a while, however, before people land on Mars. This is why robots need to do the work for now, and Perseverance has quite a lot of it in store. It will land in the Jezero Crater, which was once filled with water, with the task of investigating whether the area was once habitable. At the same time, the rover will search for signs of earlier life, known as biosignatures. It is equipped with a variety of measuring instruments for this purpose.
Its third task is to pave the way for human missions with a technology demonstration: An instrument named MOXIE will extract oxygen from the small amount present in the Martian atmosphere. This technology would be crucial for human missions, as oxygen is not only required for breathing, but can also be used for making fuel.
Investigating life forms
We now come to the fourth mission, the most spectacular and most technically demanding: Perseverance will take up to 30 soil samples, place them in individual vessels, seal the vessels, and then finally deposit them at a suitable location so a later mission can collect the samples and bring them back to Earth. For scientists, it doesn’t get much better than this: getting clean samples from Mars and being able to investigate them here, with all the latest techniques available. As NASA puts it, these samples have the potential to tell us more about the basis and origin of life in our solar system.
Three systems have to work together seamlessly for the sampling to succeed. First, the big robotic arm at the front of the rover drills into the Martian rock and takes a core sample, which is then inserted into a carousel. The carousel takes the sample inside the rover. There, the third system takes over. It is another robotic arm, a much smaller one called SHA. This arm takes the sample from the carousel, moves it to the volume assessment and scanning stations, then to the sealing station, and finally into temporary storage—all autonomously.
This is where maxon comes in. Several brushless DC motors are being used to handle the samples. Some of them are installed in the SHA robotic arm, which transports the samples from station to station; others are used when sealing the sample tubes and positioning them.
A base-line of successful products
Just like the more than 100 maxon drives that have previously done work on Mars, the Perseverance motors are based on standard catalogue products: specifically, nine brushless DC motors of the EC 32 flat type and one of the EC 20 flat type, in combination with a GP 22 UP planetary gearhead. Naturally, modifications were required so that the drives could meet the high demands of the mission. Nevertheless, the basis of the drives is no different from the models that are used in all kinds of applications on Earth.
maxon’s engineers have modified and repeatedly tested the motors and gearheads for three years, working closely with the specialists at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), which handles all unmanned missions for NASA. The space experts from Pasadena were frequent visitors at the Swiss headquarters of the electric motor experts. “We’ve learned a lot from this collaboration,” said Robin Phillips, head of the maxon SpaceLab. This can be seen specifically in higher quality standards and new test procedures and processes. “Customers from other industries, like the medical sector, where requirements are often similar, also benefit from this know-how.”
Phillips and his team will pay close attention to the landing of the Perseverance rover and its activities, as much will depend on the functioning of the maxon drives. In his words, “We are involved in absolutely critical applications. If the robotic arm on which our brushless DC motors are mounted doesn’t move, or if the gripper doesn’t work, then the entire mission will be a failure.”
The mission
Perseverance will search for signs of earlier life (biosignatures) on Mars, take rock and soil samples, and prepare them for return to Earth. It will also conduct experiments to pave the way for human missions.
The journey
Launch vehicle Atlas V-401
Launch site Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida (USA)
Landing date February 18, 2021
Landing site Jezero Crater
The facts
Planned At least one Martian year (687 Earth days)
duration
of mission
Weight 1025 kilograms
Length 3 meters
Height 2.2 meters.
For more information contact maxon motor Australia tel. +61 2 9457 7477.
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