RESEARCH OF JET PRIMARY CONVERTERS OF JOINT POSITION WHEN WELDING THIN-WALLED PRODUCTS

The main types of primary jet pneumatic converters used in argon-arc welding of thin-walled products with a thickness of no more than 0.6 mm are considered. Were investigated the static characteristics of pneumatic converters with cylindrical and slotted nozzles. During the analysis of the results, the most suitable pneumatic transducer was selected, which has the highest sensitivity.

Dynamics of Single-Action Pneumatic Actuators

The asymmetry in the dynamics of an electro-pneumatic actuating device consisting of an electro-pneumatic transducer and a single-action pneumatic actuator was unexpectedly found experimentally. This asymmetry manifests in response to large step excitations. The dynamic asymmetry effect is understood as a change in the shape of the response of an actuator depending on the direction of the actuators stem movement. The questions appears: How to explain this effect? Does this phenomenon reflect thermodynamic air processes? Is it connected with air-to-mechanical energy conversion? Together, six working hypotheses explaining this effect were formulated. The asymmetry was studied in detail using analytical and simulation modeling, as well as experimental research. In this respect, a nonlinear analytical model was developed, tuned, and later solved using simulations. The simulation model was verified based on the experiment data. In addition, the problem of the efficiency in the energy conversion of a single-action actuator was discussed and, in result, the maximum theoretical energy efficiency was determined. Subsequently, all six working hypotheses were verified. Finally, the hypothesis explaining asymmetry as an effect of the different thermodynamic air processes in both actuator’s stem travel directions was confirmed.

The Trade-Off between the Controller Effort and Control Quality on Example of an Electro-Pneumatic Final Control Element

For many years, the programmable positioners have been widely applied in structures of modern electro-pneumatic final control elements. The positioner consists of an electro-pneumatic transducer, embedded controller, and measuring instrumentation. Electro-pneumatic transducers that are used in positioners are characterized by a relatively short mean time-to-failure. The practical and economical method of a reasonable prolongation of this time is proposed in this paper. It is principally based on assessment and minimizing the effort of the embedded controller. For this purpose, some measures were introduced: The control value variability, mean-time, and the cumulative controller’s effort. The diminishing of controller effort has significant practical repercussions because it reduces the intensity of mechanical wear of the final control element components. On the other hand, the reduction of the cumulative effort is important in the context of process economy due to limitation of the consumption of energy of compressed air supplying the final control element. Therefore, the minimization of control effort indicators has an impact on the increase of the functional safety and economics of the controlled process. The simulations were performed in the Matlab-Simulink environment with the use of the liquid level control system in which a phenomenological model of a final control element was deployed. As a result of the performed simulations, the recommendations regarding the selection of the structure of positioner controller were elaborated.

The Trade-Off between the Controller Effort and Control Quality on Example of an Electro-Pneumatic Final Control Element

For many years, the programmable positioners have been widely applied in structures of modern electro-pneumatic final control elements. The positioner consists of an electro-pneumatic transducer, embedded controller and measuring instrumentation. Electro-pneumatic transducers that are used in positioners are characterized by a relatively short mean time-to-failure. The practical and economical method of a reasonable prolongation of this time is proposed in this paper. It is principally based on assessment and minimizing the effort of the embedded controller. For this purpose, were introduced: the control value variability, mean-time and the cumulative controller's effort. The diminishing of controller effort has significant practical repercussions, because it reduces the intensity of mechanical wear of the final control element components. On the other hand, the reduction of the cumulative effort is important in the context of process economy due to limitation of the consumption of energy of compressed air supplying the final control element. Therefore, the minimization of introduced effort factors has an impact on increasing the functional safety and economics of the controlled process. As a result of the performed simulations, the recommendations regarding the selection of the structure and tuning of positioner controller were elaborated. The simulations were performed in the Matlab-Simulink environment with the use of the liquid level control system in which a phenomenological model of a final control element was deployed. It has been proven that under appropriate conditions, it is possible to extend significantly the lifetime of the final control element and simultaneously enhance the control quality factors.

A Driver’s Seat With Active Suspension of Electro-pneumatic Type

The aim of this article is to summarize some of the results of a study of a driver’s seat with an electro-pneumatic active suspension utilizing a pneumatic spring and a proportional electro-pneumatic transducer. Discussion of the system’s simplified mathematical description is followed by a short explanation of the full scale dummy driver’s seat with active pneumatic suspension and discussion of some experimental results.