3362 results about "Snubber" patented technology

Methods and systems for damping vibrations in a surgical system are disclosed herein. The surgical system can include one or several moveable set-up linkages. A damper can be connected with one or several of the set-up linkages. The damper can be a passive, active, or semi-active damper. The damper can mitigate a vibration arising in one of the set-up linkages, and the damper can prevent a vibration arising in one of the linkages from affecting another of the set-up linkages. The active and semi-active dampers can be controlled with a feedback model and a feed-forward model.

A power converter for converting energy from a green power unit as e.g. a solar cell into energy fed into the commercial grid is described. The object is to provide a versatile modularized power converter with eased access to control of the power switches. Another object is to improve the electrical efficiency. This is achieved by using an independent controller on a DC / DC module and an independent controller on a DC / AC module, whereby the two independent controllers communicate with each other and the outside world by means of a communication bus. Further, the DC / DC module of the power converter comprises a transformer which transfers energy from the DC / DC module to the DC / AC module. This design enables independent control of the modules and eases controllability of the power switches in order to suppress retroaction from pulsations generated on the mains when supplying energy to a single phase grid. Hereby the electrical efficiency of the power converter is increased. Also, an active snubber circuit is described which further increase the efficiency.

A power converter for converting energy from a green power unit as e.g. a solar cell into energy fed into the commercial grid is described. The object is to provide a versatile modularized power converter with eased access to control of the power switches. Another object is to improve the electrical efficiency. This is achieved by using an independent controller on a DC / DC module and an independent controller on a DC / AC module, whereby the the two independent controllers communicate with each other and the outside world by means of a communication bus. Further, the DC / DC module of the power converter comprises a transformer which transfers energy from the DC / DC module to the DC / AC module. This design enables independent control of the modules and eases controllability of the power switches in order to suppress retroaction from pulsations generated on the mains when supplying energy to a single phase grid. Hereby the electrical efficiency of the power converter is increased. Also, an active snubber circuit is described which further increase the efficiency.

A self-pressurized damper, for example, a pressure-sensitive damper is described. At least one suspension spring is used to pressurize the damping fluid, a task typically carried out by a sealed moveable barrier, such as an internal floating piston (IFP) and a pressurized gas. Thus, stroke length may be maximized. Furthermore, the amount of compression damping force produced by the damper may be a function of the force generated by the at least one suspension spring.

A thermostat providing modulated or analog control of valves or dampers of an air management system. This permits operating a single cooling or heating stage with partially open valves or dampers as needed, since one full stage that is either fully on or off may not be easy to manage for effective air management of a particular type of building, zone or facility. The thermostat may also provide non-modulated control of multi-stage cooling and heating systems. The thermostat may even be used to control a modulated system having more than one stage of cooling or heating.

A high density non-volatile memory system, card, and device is described that incorporates a synchronous interface. This is accomplished through use of an external or embedded controller and / or memory buffer to manage the high density non-volatile memory device(s) to present it as a conventional memory device having a synchronous interface that is accessible by row and column address. This allows the high density non-volatile memory to support in-place code execution and allows it to be booted from. Additionally, this incorporation eliminates the overhead of drivers and / or operating system support required to utilize and present conventional high density non-volatile memory devices and moves it internal to the memory device. This simplifies the use and design effort in the overhead and specialized interfacing of high density non-volatile memories and in particular, NAND architecture Flash memories, while reducing the production cost through use of less expensive high density non-volatile memory.

A robot cleaner. The robot cleaner comprises a bumper for buffering a shock caused by a sudden collision with an unexpected obstacle, and an unexpected obstacle detecting means and a controller to change a running direction in the collision with the obstacle to avoid the obstacle. Accordingly, when an unexpected obstacle appears in front of the cleaner and the cleaner collides with the obstacle, the bumper buffers and absorbs the shock, thereby preventing damages to a cleaner body and inner parts. Also, the robot cleaner can avoid the obstacle, and thus complete a cleaning operation without stopping the cleaning operation.

Systems and methods are provided for determining and providing an appropriate variable voltage supply to a power amplifier. A power amplifier is operative to amplify an input signal. A digital buffer stores a copy of the input signal representing a predetermined interval of time. An envelope profiler analyzes the buffered interval of the input signal and determines an appropriate supply signal profile for the power amplifier over the predetermined time interval. A supply control provides a supply signal according to the determined profile.

A control scheme is provided for stopping an internal combustion engine of a hybrid powertrain during ongoing vehicle operation. The method, executed as program code in an article of manufacture comprises the following steps in the sequence set forth. First, engine operation is controlled to stop firing the engine. A damper clutch is controlled to lock rotation of the engine and the electro-mechanical transmission. Torque outputs from the first and second electrical machines are then selectively controlled to reduce engine speed. Torque outputs from the first and second electrical machines are then selectively controlled to stop rotation of the engine substantially near a predetermined crank position.

A system and method in accordance with the present invention provides for a low cost, bulk micromachined accelerometer integrated with electronics. The accelerometer can also be integrated with rate sensors that operate in a vacuum environment. The quality factor of the resonances is suppressed by adding dampers. Acceleration sensing in each axis is achieved by separate structures where the motion of the proof mass affects the value of sense capacitors differentially. Two structures are used per axis to enable full bridge measurements to further reduce the mechanical noise, immunity to power supply changes and cross axis coupling. To reduce the sensitivity to packaging and temperature changes, each mechanical structure is anchored to a single anchor pillar bonded to the top cover.

Disclosed is a shift register capable of mitigating gate bias stress. The shift register, including a plurality of stages, includes an output buffer having a pull-up transistor and two pull-down transistors, each with gates connected to different nodes. One of the two pull-down transistors operates during an even frame portion of an LCD operation; and the other of the two pull-down transistors operates during an odd frame portion of the LCD display operation. Alternating operation of the pull-down transistors substantially mitigates gate stress, and substantially enables the shift register to be fabricated with amorphous silicon.

A control system for a resilient support mechanism such as a suspension mechanism of a wheeled vehicle including a damper disposed between an unsprung mass member and a sprung mass member of the vehicle, wherein a damping coefficient of the damper is divided into a linear portion and a nonlinear portion, and wherein the nonlinear portion of the damping coefficient is defined as a control input u and applied with a frequency weight Wu(s), while a vertical velocity of the sprung mass member, a relative velocity of the sprung mass member to the unsprung mass member and a vertical acceleration of the sprung mass member are defined as an evaluation output zp and applied with a frequency weight Ws(s). In the control system, a nonlinear Hinfin control theory is applied to a generalized plant to obtain a positive definite symmetric solution P and to calculate a target damping force based on the positive definite symmetric solution P and a state amount such as the vertical velocity of the sprung mass member, a relative displacement of the sprung mass member to the unsprung mass member or the like.

A damper comprising a duct defining an air flow path, opposing damper blades pivotally mounted within the duct, each damper blade having an end that is pivotally mounted in cantilevered fashion in the duct so that an opposing end is free to move within the duct, wherein each damper blade is planar in shape, cooperating flow straightening members disposed centrally in the air flow path, an air flow sensor for generating a signal cooperatively disposed between the flow straightening members, and an actuator for pivoting each damper blade within the duct in response to the signal from the air flow sensor to vary the damper blade position and thereby maintain a desired velocity of air exiting the damper.

A regenerative damper and method for regenerative damping are disclosed. The regenerative damper uses the kinetic energy of undesirable vehicle motion to generate electrical current in a circuit. The electricity is generated by a power screw that operates like an alternator. Vehicle energy efficiency is increased by using the electrical current to charge a battery. The regenerative damper can be semi-active or passive. The semi-active embodiment is able to adapt to operating conditions to improve vehicle ride and handling, whereas the passive embodiment has a fixed response, regardless of operating conditions.

A device and method that may be used at nearly any place to set and adjust a control system such as a thermostat, controller or computer having numerous parameters and options that may be selected for desired operation of an air management system. One may remotely, via a personal digital assistant, configure, commission, select, set or adjust the parameters and options of a control system, which may include, but not be limited to, temperatures, humidity, sensors, volume of air movement, fan or air mover behavior, the percentage of added fresh air, modulated and non-modulated control of valves and dampers, stages of cooling and heating at various zones, control of heat pumps, heaters and air conditioners, modes of occupied, unoccupied or standby of respective spaces in a building, for day and night, at selected times, on certain days, for specific buildings at particular locations.

A control system is operatively associated with a suspension system of a vehicle. The associated suspension system includes an associated fluid spring operating at an associated fluid pressure and an associated variable-rate damper having an associated electronically-variable damping rate. The control system includes a pressure sensor operative to generate a pressure sensor signal indicative of the associated fluid pressure of the associated fluid spring, and a controller in communication with the pressure sensor and the associated variable-rate damper. The controller is operative to receive the pressure sensor signal and generate a damper adjustment signal based at least partially on the pressure sensor signal for adjusting the associated electronically-variable damping rate of the associated variable-rate damper. A vehicle suspension system includes such a control system, and a method of controlling a suspension system of a vehicle is also included.

The invention relates to a hydrodynamic torque converter with an impeller connected on the drive side arranged in housing and a turbine driven by the latter, connected with the driven side of the torque converter, with a turbine damper actively disposed between the turbine and driven side. To improve the vibration damping on the driven side of the torque converter, it is proposed the turbine damper with a first damper part formed out of an input part connected with the turbine and an intermediate flange, limited and rotatable opposite and against the action of at least a first energy accumulator and a second damper part with the intermediate flange and an output part limited and rotatable oppositely and against the action of at least a second energy accumulator, wherein an adaptive-speed vibration absorber is arranged on the intermediate flange.

A method of preventing data loss in a data storage system includes supplying write data to a high speed volatile write buffer and supplying electrical power from an energy storage device upon detection of a primary power loss event. The backup electrical power is supplied to the write buffer and nonvolatile cache. Under backup power, the write data is transferred into the nonvolatile cache and the backup power is removed. Upon regaining main power, a data presence indication triggers a transfer of the write data from the nonvolatile cache to the long term storage media. The method may be implemented for a system to protect it from inadvertent power losses or it may implemented in a system where the long term storage device is power cycled to save power. The energy storage device is not necessarily needed in the power cycled system unless power failure protection is also desired.

A memory system is disclosed. The memory system includes a memory controller coupled to one or more memory modules, at least one of the memory modules including a buffer. The memory controller is configured to convey a command to at least one of the memory modules in response to detecting that no memory requests addressed to the at least one of the memory modules have been received during a specified window of time. In response to the command, the buffer of the at least one of the memory modules is configured to enter a reduced power state. The specified window of time may be either a specified number of memory refresh intervals or buffer sync intervals. The memory controller maintains a count of memory refresh or buffer sync intervals.

A system and method for controlling a damping system. The system has at least two dampers for damping between sprung and unsprung masses in the compression and rebound directions. Sensors generate signals based on position and other parameters of motion representative of the displacement between the sprung and unsprung masses. The process determines the appropriate compression and rebound forces to be applied at the wheels. A regulator responds to at least one of the independent compression and rebound control signals for adjusting, respectively, at least one of compression and rebound resisting forces of the dampers between the masses. Compliance for the dampers is emulated with software to produce the desired compliance forces. The distributed controller includes a processor that is responsive to signals representative of the position signals for forming the compression and rebound control signals for the regulator as a function of motion between the masses or a motion of a vehicle in which the dampers are located. The system has the capability of locking the suspension when parked.

An electro-optical arrangement includes an electrochromic device which can take either a cleared (transparent) state, a first display state or a second display state, and a driving stage which provides first and second electrode-drive signals to drive the first and second electrodes of the device. At least one of the electrode-drive signals is supplied by way of a polysilicon thin-film buffer. The driving stage in an initial clearing operation outputs approximately equal voltages to the electrodes, which places the device into its transparent state. Subsequently the driver stage applies voltages to the electrodes, such that the device assumes either the first display state or the second display state. In either state it is arranged for the device not to be subjected to more than a safe operating voltage. Preferably, in one of the electrochromic device's two display states one of its electrodes is supplied with a voltage which is higher than the voltage (Vcom) on the other electrode, while in the other of its two display states the one electrode is supplied with a voltage which is lower than the voltage (Vcom) on the other electrode, the two voltage differences being less than the safe operating voltage. The second display state may itself be a transparent state, while the first display state may be a colored state. Alternatively, the two states may be differently colored states.

In order to form a noise suppressor in a hose of e.g. a motor vehicle, modular portions are connected in series to define suppression chambers with particular noise suppression characteristics. Those characteristics are due to the volume of each chamber, to the size of the apertures from the chambers to the central duct of the suppressor, and optionally due to spacers which are inserted into at least one aperture of the chambers to alter the effective open area of that aperture. Such spacers may also be used in which the noise suppressor is not modular. Where modular portions are used, it is preferable that each chamber is bounded by parts of two modular portions. A wall of one modular portion may then close the chamber in another modular portion, making the manufacture of the modular portions easier. Also disclosed is the use of a mass acting as a damper, which may be a noise suppressor as previously discussed, within a hose. The mass is connected to the hose by resilient means, e.g. electrometric material.

A spectral resistor based on the constitute law of “elasticity of electricity” derived from the Riemann-Lebesgue lemma is provided to build a substantial order-∞ resonant tank. The substantial order-∞ resonant tank according to embodiments of the present invention can function as many different roles such as an electric filter, a harmonic and sub-harmonic power waveform distortion filter, a dynamic damper, a dynamic impedance matching circuit and a kind of electromagnetic wave absorbing material. By attaching an order-∞ resonant tank according to the present invention to an ordinary system with equivalent inductance in a suitable topology as an electric filter, a substantial snubber network, or so-called DeLenzor, is obtained. The duality of an electric system can be handled by coupling the system with an order-∞ resonant tank according to the present invention, and thus the disadvantageous effects caused by the duality of the system can be canceled immediately without any drawbacks. Furthermore, the reactive (or so-called regenerated) power caused by the duality of the electric system can be recycled according to embodiments of the present invention.

A sample jitter buffer manager more or less aggressively conserves (rations) or discards data in a jitter buffer, based on the fluctuating amount of data in the jitter buffer. The jitter buffer manager counts, provides, discards and / or otherwise manages individual sample data units, rather than entire packets. Normally, enough data is removed from the jitter buffer to fill a data packet for a receiver. However, if the amount of data in the jitter buffer is low, less data is removed from the jitter buffer and placed into the packet, and the remainder of the packet is filled with duplicates of some of the data in the packet or in the jitter buffer. As the jitter buffer fills beyond a useful level, the jitter buffer discards progressively larger amounts of data, without necessarily discarding one or more entire packets. This fine-grained management of the amount of data in the jitter buffer maintains a buffer size that can provide a steady stream of packets to the receiver, without significantly impacting the fidelity of a signal represented by the data, and it mitigates the impact of fluctuations in packet inter-arrival times.

A torque converter having a first damper stage, a second damper stage, a floating flange torsionally connecting the first and second damper stages, an inertia element, and a tuned torsion damper. The torsion damper connects the inertia element and the flange. In a preferred embodiment, the inertia element is a turbine. In one embodiment, the first damper stage is a radially outer damper stage and the second damper stage is a radially inner damper stage. In another embodiment, the torsion damper generates a friction torque when rotated.

A vibration actuator includes an electromechanical transducer having a magnetic circuit (1-4) and a driving coil (5), a support frame (9), and a damper (270) elastically supporting the magnetic circuit onto the support frame to flexibly damp the vibration of the magnetic circuit when a driving AC current is supplied to the coil (5). The damper (270) comprises inner and outer ring portions (271, 272) and a plurality of spiral spring portions (273) determined by a plurality of spiral slits (274, 275) formed in the damper. In order to reduce the spiral spring portion determined by the adjacent two spiral slits in its compliance, each of the spiral spring portions has an effective spring length determined by an effective angle (theta) which is determined as an angle (by angular degree) from an inner end of the inner spiral slit to an outer end of the outer spiral slit defining each respective spiral spring portion around a center of the damper. The effective angle is 55 angular degree or more. In a preferable example, the effective spring length is determined by a product (r.theta) of an average radius (r) value by the unit of "mm" and the effective angle (theta) value by unit of the angular degree. The effective spring length is selected to 320 or more, and preferably 400 or more.

A self-regulated system and method for cooling switching power supplies that take parasitic effects of switching which would normally be dissipated as heat in a typical RC snubber circuit, and use that waste energy to power a cooling element to automatically cool semiconductor switches of the power supplies and any DC or AC systems. The cooling element can be a variable speed fan, a liquid pump, a Peltier device, or the like, in which case the system and method provide power to the cooling element in proportion to the amount of current delivered to the power supply, and so the cooling system automatically adjusts itself to the level needed to protect the power supply.