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• Featured Application: Laser Cutting Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastic Composites
  lasers and marking heads. Newsletter 245: Laser Cutting Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastic Composites, Marking SMT Chip Resistors, Basic Laser System Configurations. Synrad, Inc. - www.synrad.com. Thursday, September 2, 2010. Issue 245. Applications at a Glance. Cutting Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastic...
• Don't Rule Out Plasma for Cutting Aluminum
  In any discussion about how to cut metal, plasma cutting is right up there with laser and waterjet. The technology gets a bad rap, though, when the discussion turns to cutting aluminum. There are five preconceptions that many fabricators have about turning to plasma to cut aluminum. But according...
• Door No. 1, Door No. 2 or Door No. 3?
  This article explores the three most common metal cutting processes - laser, oxyfuel and plasma - to help you make a confident and informed decision on the process that best suits your needs. The cutting method you choose depends on your individual needs and what areas are most critical to you: cut...
• Liver On A Chip? Maybe Someday, Say Researchers
  micromachining is ideal for this application for a variety of reasons," says Jeffrey P. Sercel, president. "Short-wavelength UV laser energy is ideal for clean cutting, drilling, and shaping polymer and other materials that are difficult to micromachine using other technologies. Although an etching...
• Water Jets Cut Machining Time, Cost
  water-jet cutting with CNC X-Y-Z programming instead. A stream of water with adjustable flow rate, water pressure, and diameter cuts into parts. Plain water cuts softer materials like reinforced plastics and composites. Abrasive media speed cutting or assist in cutting harder materials. Water-jet cutting...
• Blasted away
  Abrasive etching is an economical way to precision machine ceramics and other brittle materials. The Photo-Machining Process from Ikonics Corp., Duluth Minn., simultaneously etched 0.012-in.-diameter thru-holes in a thin silicon wafer in about 15 min. Laser drilling could take hours depending...
• Color printers for the design lab
  Solid-ink technology may make color output as common as laser prints. Highly magnified views of color laser (top) and solid ink (bottom). Note the greater consistency and the dense, crisp appearance of the solid-ink image. Most engineers pour their heart and soul into their work. They design...
• Pulling out the stops
  distribution, circuit breakers, and heater SSRs along the top. A PLC mounts in the bottom left. Servomotor-powered pinch drives are electronically geared to either a programmed speed or to input from an upstream size-feedback device such as a laser micrometer or CCD-based vision system. The rollers...
• Materials EngineeringL Bumper-to-Bumper Looks That Last
  molder and Austrian materials supplier to create cutting-edge features that give the small car a highly-differentiated look. The team chose polypropylene-based Daplen thermoplastic olefins (TPOs) from Borealis for bumpers and dashboards. Daplen EE103AE, a high-melt-flow-rate (MFR) TPO, resists...
• Gaining speed-to-market with new plastic products
  and suggested adhesive bonding instead. This eliminated a manufacturing problem that would have delayed full production. Often you can fold one phase of a project into another. For example, mold-flow analysis and structural analysis can be done simultaneously, cutting development time by several...

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