Engineering Papers⌕ Search

SEARCH · Engineering Papers

Results for “Contacts”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 1,099 records · Page 61

Effects of ultravacuum and space environment on contact ohmic resistance (AO 138-11)

The experiment was aimed at checking compatibility of the aluminum conductors with conventional conductors and contacts under different conditions of manufacturing (mechanical or magnetostrictive crimping) and storage in laboratory or in long-duration space environment. The electrical characteristics of connections built from nickel-plated conductors and glided copper contacts were noted to vary over the duration of the experiment. These variations are unrelated with the crimping or storage conditions or with metal pairing (nickel-plated aluminum/tinned or silver copper). Such evolutions, even slight, are detrimental to connection quality. The same observations hold for some like connections subjected to long-duration thermal cycles. Therefore, work on aluminum technology was reoriented toward a silver aluminum conductor/ golded aluminum contact solution. The first evaluation test performed according to this definition have yielded satisfactory results.

Assie, Jean Pierre↗

A new method for measuring low resistivity contacts between silver and YBa2Cu3O(7-x) superconductor

Several methods of measuring contact resistivity between silver electrodes and YBa2Cu3O(7-x) superconductors were investigated; including the two-point, the three point, and the lap-joint methods. The lap-joint method was found to yield the most consistent and reliable results and is proposed as a new technique for this measurement. Painting, embedding, and melting methods were used to apply the electrodes to the superconductor. Silver electrodes produced good ohmic contacts to YBa2Cu3O(7-x) superconductors with contact resistivities as low as 1.9 x 10 to the -9th ohm sq cm.

Hsi, Chi-Shiung↗

Rugged Low-Resistance Contacts To High-Tc Superconductors

Newly developed technique involving use of gold makes possible to fabricate low-resistance contacts with rugged connections to high-Tc superconductors. Gold diffused into specimen of superconducting material by melting gold beads onto surface of specimen, making strong mechanical contacts. Shear strength of gold bead contacts greater than epoxy or silver paste. Practical use in high-current-carrying applications of new high-Tc materials, including superconducting magnets, long-wavelength sensors, electrical ground planes at low temperatures, and efficient transmission of power.

Caton, Randall↗

Thermal Conductances Of Cold Metal Contacts Below 6 K

Conductances vary with temperature according to simple power law. Report presents data on thermal conductances of pure aluminum and stainless-steel 304 contact pairs. Data cover contacts with surface finishes of 0.1- to 1.6-micrometer root-mean-square roughness at temperatures from 1.6 to 6.0 K, under applied contact forces up to 670 N. Such data needed for optimal design of bolted joints in cryogenic instruments, particularly infrared instruments and focal-plane sensors.

Salerno, L. J.↗

Substantially Oxygen-Free Contact Tube

A device for arc welding is provided in which a continuously-fed electrode wire is in electrical contact with a contact tube. The contact tube is improved by using a substantially oxygen-free conductive alloy in order to reduce the amount of electrical erosion.

Pike, James F.↗

Development of a contact lens quality monitoring system

The quality of contact lens samples depends strongly on their free volume fractions. It is expected that the free volume fraction of the test samples will also impact their attenuation coefficients for soft x rays. Samples with larger free volume fractions should have lower linear attenuation coefficients. Linear attenuation coefficients for Cd-109/Ag-109 x rays have been measured in five contact lens samples. It has been shown that the difference in the linear attenuation coefficients of discs from any given sample are entirely due to the difference in their respective volume fractions. It is therefore concluded that an x ray attenuation measurement system can serve as a quality monitor for contact lens polymers.

Singh, Jag J.↗

Contact stresses in meshing spur gear teeth: Use of an incremental finite element procedure

Contact stresses in meshing spur gear teeth are examined. The analysis is based upon an incremental finite element procedure that simultaneously determines the stresses in the contact region between the meshing teeth. The teeth themselves are modeled by two dimensional plain strain elements. Friction effects are included, with the friction forces assumed to obey Coulomb's law. The analysis assumes that the displacements are small and that the tooth materials are linearly elastic. The analysis procedure is validated by comparing its results with those for the classical two contacting semicylinders obtained from the Hertz method. Agreement is excellent.

Hsieh, Chih-Ming↗

Effects of ultra-vacuum and space environment on contact ohmic resistance: LDEF experiment AO 138-11

The FRECOPA experimentation of chemical resistance of electrical connector contacts, as described, has evidenced the detrimental time variations of nickel plated conductors and gilded copper contacts, irrespective of crimping storage or metal peening conditions. With a view to reorient aluminum technology a silvered aluminum conductor/gilded aluminum contact solution was evaluated.

Assie, Jean-Pierre↗

Effect of extended tooth contact on the modeling of spur gear transmissions

In some gear dynamic models, the effect of tooth flexibility is ignored when the model determines which pairs of teeth are in contact. Deflection of loaded teeth is not introduced until the equations of motion are solved. This means the zone of tooth contact and average tooth meshing stiffness are underestimated and the individual tooth load is overstated, especially for heavily-loaded gears. The static transmission error and dynamic load of heavily-loaded, low-contact-ratio spur gears is compared with this effect both neglected and included. Neglecting the effect yields an underestimate of resonance speeds and an overestimate of the dynamic load.

Oswald, Fred B.↗

A study of subsurface crack initiation produced by rolling contact fatigue

Results of subsurface crack initiation studies produced by pure rolling contact fatigue in 7075-T6 aluminum alloy are presented in this article. Microstructural changes and subsequent crack initiation below the contacting surface in cylindrical test specimens subjected to repeated rolling contact are illustrated. The rolling conditions are simulated in a three-dimensional elastic-plastic finite element model in order to estimate the plastic strains and residual stresses in the test material. The numerically estimated distribution of plastic strains in the model correlate well with the extent of microstructural changes observed in the test specimen. Results also indicate that a combination of plastic strains and low values of residual stresses is conducive to subsurface crack initiation and growth.

Kumar, Arun M.↗

Thermal conductance of gold plated metallic contacts at liquid helium temperatures

The thermal conductance of gold plated OFHC copper, 6061-T6 aluminum, free-machining brass, and 304 stainless steel contacts has been measured over the temperature range of 1.6 to 4.2 K, with applied forces from 22 N to 670 N. The contact surfaces were prepared with a 0.8 micron lapped finish prior to gold coating. It was found that for all materials, except stainless steel, the thermal conductance was significantly improved as the result of gold coating the contact surfaces.

Kittel, Peter↗

Conjugate gradient based projection - A new explicit methodology for frictional contact

With special attention towards the applicability to parallel computation or vectorization, a new and effective explicit approach for linear complementary formulations involving a conjugate gradient based projection methodology is proposed in this study for contact problems with Coulomb friction. The overall objectives are focussed towards providing an explicit methodology of computation for the complete contact problem with friction. In this regard, the primary idea for solving the linear complementary formulations stems from an established search direction which is projected to a feasible region determined by the non-negative constraint condition; this direction is then applied to the Fletcher-Reeves conjugate gradient method resulting in a powerful explicit methodology which possesses high accuracy, excellent convergence characteristics, fast computational speed and is relatively simple to implement for contact problems involving Coulomb friction.

Tamma, Kumar K.↗

Effect of extended tooth contact on the modeling of spur gear transmissions

In some gear dynamic models, the effect of tooth flexibility is ignored when the model determines which pairs of teeth are in contact. Deflection of loaded teeth is not introduced until the equations of motion are solved. This means the zone of tooth contact and average tooth meshing stiffness are underestimated and the individual tooth load is overstated, especially for heavily-loaded gears. The static transmission error and dynamic load of heavily-loaded, low-contact-ratio spur gears is compared with this effect both neglected and included. Neglecting the effect yields an underestimate of resonance speeds and an overestimate of the dynamic load.

Lin, Hsiang H.↗

Computer program for analysis of high speed, single row, angular contact, spherical roller bearing, SASHBEAN. Volume 2: Mathematical formulation and analysis

Spherical roller bearings have typically been used in applications with speeds limited to about 5000 rpm and loads limited for operation at less than about 0.25 million DN. However, spherical roller bearings are now being designed for high load and high speed applications including aerospace applications. A computer program, SASHBEAN, was developed to provide an analytical tool to design, analyze, and predict the performance of high speed, single row, angular contact (including zero contact angle), spherical roller bearings. The material presented is the mathematical formulation and analytical methods used to develop computer program SASHBEAN. For a given set of operating conditions, the program calculates the bearings ring deflections (axial and radial), roller deflections, contact areas stresses, depth and magnitude of maximum shear stresses, axial thrust, rolling element and cage rotational speeds, lubrication parameters, fatigue lives, and rates of heat generation. Centrifugal forces and gyroscopic moments are fully considered. The program is also capable of performing steady-state and time-transient thermal analyses of the bearing system.

Aggarwal, Arun K.↗

A methodology to model physical contact between structural components in NASTRAN

Two components of a structure which are located side by side, will come in contact by certain force and will transfer the compressive force along the contact area. If the force acts in the opposite direction, the elements will separate and no force will be transferred. If this contact is modeled, the load path will be correctly represented, and the load redistribution results in more realistic stresses in the structure. This is accomplished by using different sets of rigid elements for different loading conditions, or by creating multipoint constraint sets. Comparison of these two procedures is presented for a 4 panel unit (PU) stowage drawer installed in an experiment rack in the Spacelab Life Sciences (SLS-2) payload.

Prabhu, Annappa A.↗

Generation and Computerized Simulation of Meshing and Contact of Modified Involute Helical Gears

The design and generation of modified involute helical gears that have a localized and stable bearing contact, and reduced noise and vibration characteristics are described. The localization of the bearing contact is achieved by the mismatch of the two generating surfaces that are used for generation of the pinion and the gear. The reduction of noise and vibration will be achieved by application of a parabolic function of transmission errors that is able to absorb the almost linear function of transmission errors caused by gear misalignment. The meshing and contact of misaligned gear drives can be analyzed by application of computer programs that have been developed. The computations confirmed the effectiveness of the proposed modification of the gear geometry. A numerical example that illustrates the developed theory is provided.

Litvin, Faydor L.↗

Computerized Design and Generation of Low-Noise Gears with Localized Bearing Contact

The results of research projects directed at the reduction of noise caused by misalignment of the following gear drives: double-circular arc helical gears, modified involute helical gears, face-milled spiral bevel gears, and face-milled formate cut hypoid gears are presented. Misalignment in these types of gear drives causes periodic, almost linear discontinuous functions of transmission errors. The period of such functions is the cycle of meshing when one pair of teeth is changed for the next. Due to the discontinuity of such functions of transmission errors high vibration and noise are inevitable. A predesigned parabolic function of transmission errors that is able to absorb linear discontinuous functions of transmission errors and change the resulting function of transmission errors into a continuous one is proposed. The proposed idea was successfully tested using spiral bevel gears and the noise was reduced a substantial amount in comparison with the existing design. The idea of a predesigned parabolic function is applied for the reduction of noise of helical and hypoid gears. The effectiveness of the proposed approach has been investigated by developed TCA (tooth contact analysis) programs. The bearing contact for the mentioned gears is localized. Conditions that avoid edge contact for the gear drives have been determined. Manufacturing of helical gears with new topology by hobs and grinding worms has been investigated.

Litvin, Faydor L.↗

Sinterless Formation Of Contacts On Indium Phosphide

Improved technique makes it possible to form low-resistivity {nearly equal to 10(Sup-6) ohm cm(Sup2)} electrical contacts on indium phosphide semiconductor devices without damaging devices. Layer of AgP2 40 Angstrom thick deposited on InP before depositing metal contact. AgP2 interlayer sharply reduces contact resistance, without need for sintering.

Weizer, Victor G.↗