An automated parking system includes a multi-story tower having a central elevator shaft. The building is substantially circular in cross section and contains a plurality of parking stalls that radiate from the elevator shaft on each of the stories. An elevator mechanism elevates a turntable, rotatably mounted on the elevator mechanism for rotation about a substantially vertical axis, between the several floors of the building. A shuttle travels from the turntable to an entrance ramp on the ground level of the building, moves a vehicle to be parked from the entrance ramp to the turntable, whereupon the elevator and turntable cooperate to deposit the vehicle in a parking stall on one of the several floors. The elevator and turntable mechanism operate in reverse to carry the vehicle from a parking stall to an exit ramp on the ground floor of the building.

The present invention relates to a space-saving, automated parking system, and several subassemblies therefor, including a shuttle mechanism for picking up a vehicle and transferring it from a parking stall to a turntable mechanism, a device associated with the shuttle for extending its reach into a parking stall and thereby reducing the overall required diameter of the building, and mechanism for feeding hydraulic and electrical lines to a shuttle as it moves on and off a turntable.
Parking and storage space for vehicles, especially automobiles, has become scarce in urban areas and is at a premium especially in city center areas where high density shopping and business buildings are located. Additionally, parking space is becoming expensive to provide even in suburban or regional shopping centers where land prices adjacent such shopping centers are ever constantly escalating.
It is accordingly a broad object of the present invention to provide a vehicle parking and storage system that requires a minimum of ground space, thereby reducing the cost of land for the parking and storage system and allowing land that would otherwise be utilized for parking and storage of vehicles to be more gainfully and profitably used as commercial or residential centers. It is another broad object of the present invention to provide a multi-story parking tower whereby vehicles left by their owners at a ground floor are automatically received, parked and stored, and retrieved. It is still a further object of the present invention to provide such a multi-story vehicle parking and storage tower that utilizes a minimum of mechanism so that the system can be built reasonably economically, and so that maximum parking and retrieval speeds of on the order of one minute or less can be achieved for each vehicle.

Automated parking system and subassemblies therefor


A sport monitoring system includes a projectile(s), sensor units for one or more players to wear, and a data processing arrangement. The projectiles are useable in a game played by players. Each projectile has a motion sensing arrangement for generating one or more motion-indicative signals, and a data recording arrangement for recording the motion-indicative signals as a function of time. Each sensor unit is provided with a motion sensing arrangement for generating a motion-indicative signal(s), and a data recording arrangement for recording the motion-indicative signals as a function of time. The data processing arrangement receives data pertaining to the motion-indicative signals from at least one of the projectiles and/or at least one of the sensor units. The data processing arrangement performs a temporal correlation of the data to determine one or more periods of time when the projectiles are likely to be spatially closely associated with the players.

In various team sports, it is often desirable to know when one or more players have been in contact with a projectile. For example, in a game of American football, it would be desirable to keep a track of which player has been carrying the projectile (i.e., a football) during playing of the game. Presently, such tracking is often implemented by using cameras, and personnel collating statistics manually.
However, these conventional techniques suffer from a number of disadvantages. Firstly, a viewer watching the game may not be able to identify which player has been carrying the projectile, for example, because of an unclear camera view. Secondly, manual tasks are bound to involve risks of human errors.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,353,791 discloses a method of tracking possession of a sports projectile such as a ball. Based on disclosure a ball has short range radio beacon and each player has receiver for the radio beacon signals and GPS. System can be used to determine which player is in possession of the ball. Problem with said solution is that ball possession could be determined to be on any player in proximity of the ball.
Therefore, there exists a need for a system for determining one or more periods of time when one or more projectiles are likely to be spatially closely associated with one or more players, in an automatic manner.


The present invention provides a sheet conveying apparatus with a convey roller for conveying a sheet; a plurality of pinch rollers arranged along the convey roller and adapted to urge the sheet against the convey roller; a pinch roller holder formed as one piece for supporting the plurality of pinch rollers, the rigidity of the pinch roller holder in a sheet conveying direction being greater than the rigidity of the pinch roller holder in a direction perpendicular to the sheet conveying direction; and a biasing device for acting on the pinch roller holder to urge the pinch rollers against the convey roller.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a sheet conveying apparatus for conveying a recording sheet in a printer, typewriter, copying machine and the like and a conveying apparatus for conveying an original to be read in a facsimile system, copying machine, image reader, OCR and the like, and more particularly, it relates to a sheet conveying apparatus useful for systems wherein a sheet being conveyed should not be floating at a desired position.
2. Related Background Art
In the past, sheet conveying apparatuses used with a printer, scanner and the like are mainly of the type wherein pinch rollers are urged against a convey roller comprising a high friction surface member so that a sheet pinched between the convey roller and the pinch rollers is conveyed by friction forces generated between the rollers. According to one aspect, each pinch roller is mounted on a corresponding pinch roller holder made of plastic material and is biased toward a convey roller by a spring and the like.
In the conventional sheet conveying apparatuses, it is necessary to provide one pinch roller holder for each pinch roller, and, since any gap must be maintained between the adjacent pinch roller holders, it is very difficult to urge the whole sheet against the convey roller uniformly. Thus, in an apparatus wherein a sheet being conveyed should not be floating at a desired position, there arises a problem if the sheet cannot be uniformly urged against the convey roller. Particularly, in an ink jet printer, since the sheet gets wet due to the ink discharged from a recording head, a recording surface of the sheet is floating, thereby deteriorating the recording quality.
To avoid this, a plurality of pinch rollers may be mounted on a single pinch roller holder. In this case, however, if the single pinch roller holder is distorted or twisted, there arises the dispersion in the urging forces of the pinch rollers, thus causing a problem that gaps are created between some pinch rollers and the convey roller.
The recording apparatuses can be grouped into ink jet type, wire dot type, thermal type, electrophotographic type or the like on the basis of the recording modes. The recording apparatus of ink jet type has many advantages that it has low noise, low running cost, low apparatus cost, high speed recording ability and compact body. Further, generally, since the recording head is not contacted with the recording sheet, by maintaining a small and constant gap between the recording head and the recording sheet, it is possible to obtain the high image quality. To this end, the recording sheet is held down by pinch rollers arranged near the recording head. In this case, since the recording sheet is held down in the proximity of the recording head, diameters of the pinch rollers are made smaller.
However, when the conveyance of the recording sheet and the registration of the recording sheet are effected by using the small pinch rollers and the convey roller, since a nip between each pinch roller and the convey roller is small, if a thick sheet such as a post card is handled, the sheet cannot be adequately pinched between the nips, thereby causing the poor protruded amount and the poor registration.


An ultrasonic monitoring system for the interior of a motor vehicle having two mutually spatially separately secured emission elements (S1, S2), the main lobes of the directional characteristics of which are oriented in different directions, and having at least one reception element (E1, E2), but at as a rule having at least two mutually physically separate reception elements (E1, E2). The reception elements (E1, E2) are not formed by the emission elements (S1, S2), but are physically separate from all emission elements (S1, S2). The two emission elements (S1, S2) are operated alternately with pauses in such a manner that in each instance firstly only one of the emission elements (e.g. S1) emits an ultrasonic pulse, which is thereafter received by the reception element (E1 ) associated with this emission element (S1), and only after such reception does the other emission element (S2) emit ultrasound, which is thereafter received by the reception element (E2) associated with this emission element (S2 ). The main lobes of the directional characteristics of the emission elements (S1, S2) and reception elements (E1, E2) are oriented so that each reception element (E1, E2) receives particularly clearly those emission signals of the emission element (S1, S2) associated with it (E1, E2) which propagate by repeated reflections in each instance via a plurality of panes (VS1/VS2, HS1/HS2) in the V interior of the motor vehicle.

The invention represents a development of an ultrasonic monitoring system for the interior of a motor vehicle and which, per se, is previously known, for example, from German reference DE-A1-2,817,492. This known system already permits the monitoring of the interior of a motor vehicle with relatively little effort.
In addition, U.S. Pat. No. 3,805,223 discloses an ultrasonic monitoring system having a single ultrasonic emission element and a single ultrasonic reception element--both elements having a more or less marked directional characteristic--which system is employed for the observation of fish or aquatic animals in a region filled with water--for example in an aquarium or in a pool. The main lobes of the directional characteristics of these elements are set to be oriented so that repeated reflections via a plurality of boundaries of the region filled with water--that is to say, for example, via the panes of the aquarium--are also clearly utilized, so that the movements of the fish through the monitoring system can be automatically registered not only on a rectilinear path in the water, but in a larger space in the water.
The invention presupposes that the ultrasonic monitoring system which is described below and which is shown in FIG. 1 also forms part of the prior art:
The motor vehicle shown in FIG. 1 exhibits, inter alia, six panes, namely four side panes VS1, VS2, HS1 and HS2, as well as lateral panes F and H at front and rear, namely a front pane F and a rear pane H.
Fitted on the internal surface of the roof of the motor vehicle, in the vicinity of the so-called B spars, i.e. between the front and rear side panes VS1/HS2, VS2/HS1, there are four radar elements SE1 to SE4 for ultrasonic radar, which radar elements, as is very frequently the case with radar systems, are employed in each instance both as emission elements with a marked directional characteristic and also as reception elements with a marked directional characteristic.
The main lobes of the emission directional characteristics and of the reception directional characteristics of all four radar elements SE1 to SE4 are, at least to a large extent, oriented in each instance in the same direction. In this case, the interior of the motor vehicle is thus, so to speak, monitored by a total of four emission elements and four reception elements, of which, however, each emission element forms a physical unit with a reception element. In this case, the four radar elements SE1 to SE4 monitor in each instance, more or less, only approximately one quarter of the motor vehicle interior surface represented in the plan view.
To this end, in operation, the four radar elements SE1 to SE4 emit ultrasonic pulses at a specified frequency or in a specified frequency pattern, in each instance towards a specified region on a lateral pane F, H, in each instance to the left or to the right of the center of the lateral pane, or into adjacent regions close to the pane; in this case, these four radar elements, after their switch-over, receive in each instance as reception elements especially that ultrasound which was reflected by the regions which were ensonified by these radar elements themselves in the emission phase. The received signals are converted into electrical signals in the reception elements, and, thereafter, are passed to one or more control circuits which, for their part, evaluate these signals.
In this case, these four radar elements SE1 to SE4 also monitor to a greater or lesser extent the side panes which are adjacent to the principal axis of the main lobe of the ultrasonic beam and which belong to the quarter of the interior surface. Within this ensonified region, including the pertinent side panes, certain reflections also occur, so that, via the main lobe of the reception directional characteristic of these four radar elements SE1 to SE4, certain components of ultrasonic waves which are also repeatedly reflected within the ensonified region are also received and jointly evaluated. These received, repeatedly reflected ultrasonic waves are then, however, in each instance emitted entirely, or at least preferably, by the same radar element (i.e. less from the other three radar elements) into this region.
Specifically, in the case of the example shown in FIG. 1, it is typical that the principal axes or main lobes of the emission directional characteristics and of the reception directional characteristics of all radar elements SE1 to SE4 coincide to a large extent in each instance. In any case, the principal axes of the emission directional characteristic and of the reception directional characteristic, considering each individual path of the radar elements SE1 to SE4, are not intentionally oriented in entirely different directions, in order in a controlled manner to receive as far as possible only such an ultrasonic flow as was originally emitted by another emission element in entirely different directions and thus into entirely different regions of the interior of the motor vehicle and which is intentionally received and evaluated only after repeated reflections, which are distributed over large regions of the interior of the motor vehicle.
In addition, German reference DE-C2 2,938,969--which is equivalent to European reference EP-B1-26,385 discloses an ultrasonic monitoring system in which, by means of the storage of echo profiles and by means of adaptive progressive adaptations of the system to such movements, automatic elimination takes place of those disturbances which are generated by movements which are intrinsically harmless, e.g. of air striations and fans and the like.

Ultrasonic monitoring system for the interior of a motor vehicle


A refrigeration control system is disclosed for operating a refrigeration system in a very efficient manner by controlling the refrigerant pressure in the refrigerant line between the liquid receiver and the evaporator at a pressure which is just above that at which bubbles ("flashgas") occur. An electronic sight glass is used to detect such flashgas bubbles in that liquid refrigerant line thereby indicating that more cooling capacity is required to properly operate the refrigeration system. The system controller can efficiently control various refrigeration components such that the electrical power drawn by the compressor motor is at an optimal or near-optimal rate of consumption at any given cooling requirement within the refrigeration system's cooling capacity. Some of the devices that can be controlled by the system controller include condenser fans, pressure control valves, reciprocating compressors, and screw compressors.

Refrigeration systems have been used for many years of the type which use a compressor to drive a refrigerant through a closed-loop system. The compressor increases both the pressure and the temperature of the vaporous refrigerant before the refrigerant is directed into a condenser. As it passes through the condenser, the vaporous refrigerant is cooled and condensed to a liquid, while releasing heat to the surrounding environment, usually with the aid of a fan. The liquid refrigerant is now directed to a thermal expansion valve which provides a controlled release of the high pressure liquid refrigerant into a series of coils, commonly called an evaporator. As it passes through the thermal expansion valve, the liquid refrigerant undergoes a change of state from a high pressure liquid to a lower pressure vapor, while extracting thermal energy from the atmosphere surrounding the evaporator. The vaporous refrigerant is then drawn into the compressor to close the loop and to restart the process cycle.
When the outside air temperature falls below a certain temperature, many existing refrigeration systems cannot operate at a low enough condensing capacity without generating a condition known as liquid "hold-up" in the condenser. Liquid hold-up occurs when liquid refrigerant is backed up from the liquid receiver into the condenser, thus flooding a portion of the condenser with such liquid, thereby reducing the capacity of the condenser to transfer heat from the refrigeration system. This is very inefficient from an energy utilization standpoint, because unnecessary fans are running, excessive pressure drop occurs in the liquid line between the condenser and liquid receiver, and the compressor is working harder than necessary when this condition exists.
The compressor is typically driven by an electric motor and the major portion of system energy usage is incurred by the compressor's operation. It is important to keep the pressure at the outlet of the compressor sufficiently high to force the liquid refrigerant to remain in a liquid state in the refrigerant line between the condenser and the evaporator. If the outlet pressure is not sufficiently high at the compressor, then vaporous bubbles (called "flashgas") will form in the refrigerant line, thus reducing the overall system efficiency and cooling capacity since the thermal expansion valve (TEV) capacity is reduced when the refrigerant coming to it is in a partially vaporous state. The flashgas bubbles can be detected directly by an optical sensor, such as that disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,644,755, by Esslinger et al.
In present refrigeration systems, the compressor outlet pressure is typically raised to the very high level sufficient to effectively cool the associated air spaces on the hottest day expected for that cooling season. This method of operation is, of course, not very efficient from an energy usage standpoint, since the compressor is continually consuming electrical energy at a rate that is calculated to properly work on the hottest day of that cooling season. On days where the outside ambient temperature is not as hot as the design temperature, such a refrigeration system is wasting a great amount of electrical energy.
A refrigeration system that has the capability to control the pressure in liquid refrigerant lines just above that required to maintain refrigerant in a liquid state could save electrical energy. The amount of energy saved would be the difference in the electrical energy utilized to drive the compressor hard enough to effectively cool the associated air spaces on the hottest day expected for that cooling season, and the electrical energy utilized to drive the compressor such that the pressure in the liquid refrigerant lines is controlled to a near optimal value. This energy saving would be significant, perhaps as much as fifteen percent (15%) of the entire electrical energy consumed by the refrigeration system.
A refrigeration control system that could perform the above energy savings and yet be retrofitted into existing refrigeration systems could save countless energy dollars without incurring the expense of installing entirely new refrigeration systems. If such a control system would be easily installed, then the expense of retrofitting the new refrigeration control system could be paid for quickly as the savings in energy usage occurs once the new system was put into operation.

Method and apparatus for efficiently controlling refrigeration and air conditioning systems


A reciprocating magnetic body support structure for a linear motor or a linear alternator is claimed. The body comprises a cylindrical, metallic support sleeve having a plurality of longitudinal slots evenly spaced around the circumference of the sleeve. An equal number of magnet segments is mounted to the sleeve extending over at least a portion of the associated slot and attaching to the wall of the sleeve on both sides of the associated slot. The longitudinal slots preferably extend completely through the sleeve from near one longitudinal end of the sleeve to near an opposite longitudinal end of the sleeve. The sleeve is preferably stainless steel or titanium, but should, regardless of metal, have a high resistivity, i.e., above 50 micro ohms per centimeter.

It is known in the field of electromechanical transducers that a time changing magnetic field near an electrical conductor induces a voltage across the conductor and a current to flow if there is a closed loop current path. The reverse is also true: a time changing current through an electrical conductor will cause a time changing magnetic field. This is the principle under which electromechanical transducers, which includes linear alternators and motors, function.
A prior art electromechanical transducer, specifically an alternator, is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,602,174 to Redlich. In order to increase the magnetic flux passing through the electrical conductor (to thereby increase the current generated), a coil of wire is used and a magnet reciprocates in a central passage near the center of the coil. A further enhancement is the formation of a relatively high permeability material into a flux loop through the coil. A magnet reciprocates, not inside the coil, but in a gap formed between flux path structures, and the magnetic flux flows through the structure inducing a current in the coil.
The magnets which are to be reciprocated in the gap are often embedded in a support structure which also passes through the gap. The support structure is a rigid body which permits the structurally weak magnets to be drivingly connected to another body. Since the support structure (which is commonly electrically conductive) also encounters a time changing magnetic field, current is induced in the support structure causing energy losses. These losses reduce efficiency, and the heat generated by this undesirable current can damage the magnets.
The most common configuration for a linear electromechanical transducer is the circular, axisymmetric grouping shown in FIGS. 1A and 1B. A cylindrical magnet support structure 12 reciprocates longitudinally in a gap 14 formed between flux loop segments 10 and 16. Typically, structure 12 is made up of an electrically conductive support into which magnets are embedded. As the support structure 12 reciprocates in the gap, a time varying magnetic flux passes through the support structure 12. Eddy currents are induced in the support structure from the time changing magnetic field which the support structure 12 encounters, causing a net flow of electrical current around the circumference of the support structure 12. The circumferential flow of current causes I R losses since unwanted, unusable current is generated in the support structure 12.
There is a need for a magnet support having negligible losses due to the induced current, while providing a rigid support for the magnet segments.

Magnet support sleeve for linear electromechanical transducer


A label printing device is disclosed in which font data for a plurality of characters is stored. Characters are derived from the font data for displaying and printing in sizes determined by appropriate scaling factors. In this way, characters derived for printing have the same proportion and appearance as characters derived for displaying. Moreover, a large variety of character sizes can be produced both for printing and displaying.

There are now known thermal printing devices which produce labels having a length corresponding to a message to be printed as defined by a user. Such devices operate with a supply of tape arranged to receive an image and a means for transferring an image onto the tape. In one known device, a tape holding case holds a supply of image receiving tape and a supply of an image transfer ribbon, the image receiving tape and the transfer ribbon being passed in overlap through a print zone of the printing device. At the print zone, a thermal print head cooperates with a platen to transfer an image from the transfer ribbon to the tape. A printing device operating with a tape holding case of this type is described for example in EP-A-0267890 (Varitronics Inc.). In this printing device, the image receiving tape comprises an upper layer for receiving an image which is secured to a releaseable backing layer by a layer of adhesive.
In another device, the construction of the image receiving tape is such that the upper image receiving layer is transparent and receives an image on one of its faces printed as a mirror image so that it is viewed the correct way round through the other face of the tape. In this case, a double-sided adhesive layer can be secured to the upper layer, this double-sided adhesive layer having a releaseable backing layer. This latter arrangement is described for example in EP-A-0322918 and EP-A-0322919 (Brother Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha).
Printing devices of this type also include a display means and an input means such as a keyboard for selecting characters to be printed. Selected characters are displayed on the display means and in this way a user can compose a label to be printed. When a label has been composed a print instruction is given and the printing device proceeds to print a label. Printing devices of this type also include cutting means to cut off the printed portion of the tape to enable it to be used as a label. For use as a label, the releaseable backing layer is removed from the upper layer to enable the upper layer to be secured to a surface by means of the adhesive layer. In this way, labels having a length and character arrangement determined by a user can be made.
However, the known printing devices have severe limitations as regards their ease of use in composing labels to be printed. In particular the characters displayed by the display means do not bear a relationship in terms of their size, spacing and position to the characters as will be printed out on the finished label. This makes it difficult for a user to perceive properly the final form of the label so that he must in general adopt a process where he composes a label, prints it and then reviews it to see how its format might be improved as regards character size, spacing and layout. Further, the characters displayed on the display are provided specifically for the display from a display font and thus do not resemble the characters to be printed.
The present invention seeks to overcome these difficulties in providing a printing apparatus having display means which is operable as a more useful visual aid to a user of such apparatus.
The present invention also seeks to provide a wider range of character sizes for printing and/or displaying.


A shift register includes a plurality of electrically connected shift units. Each shift unit includes a pull-up circuit, a pull-up driving circuit, a pull-down circuit, and a pull-down driving circuit. The pull-up circuit outputs a first signal to an output node according to the first signal and a voltage of a driving node. The pull-up driving drives the pull-up circuit according to an output voltage of the previous shift unit. The pull-down driving circuit outputs a low level voltage to the driving node and the output node according to the first signal and a second signal. The pull-down circuit resets the pull-up driving circuit according to the voltage of the output node and outputs the low level voltage to the output node and the driving node according to a third signal and a fourth signal.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is related to a shift register, and more particularly, to a shift register which improves the ability of pulling down the voltage level of the output node of the shift register.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The gate driver of a LCD device utilizes shift register for generating sequential scan signals. Conventionally the shift register is manufactured onto the glass substrate of the LCD device by amorphous silicon thin film transistors (a-Si TFTs) and low temperature polycrystalline silicon (LTPS) TFTs processes. The shift register usually includes multistage circuits, so certain TFTs are turned on for a relative long period of time. However, when the voltage is continuously and frequently applied to the TFTs or the LTPS TFTs for a long period of time, the TFTs tend to become malfunction due to degradation, consequently the reliability of the shift register is sabotaged.
Please refer to FIG. 1. FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating the conventional shift register. In the Nth shift register 100, the first transistor Q1 is utilized to drive the second transistor Q2. The control end and the first end of the first transistor Q1 are electrically connected to the input end of the shift register, for receiving the output signal of the previous stage SR(N−1). The second end of the first transistor Q1 is electrically connected to the control end of the second transistor Q2. The first end of the second transistor Q2 is utilized to receive the first signal CK1. The second end of the second transistor Q2 is electrically connected to the output end OUT of the shift register, for outputting the first signal CK1 to the output end OUT according to the voltage level of the driving node G. The shift register 100 includes a first pull-down module 110 and a second pull-down module 120. The third transistor Q3 and the ninth transistor Q9 are electrically connected to the output end OUT, for pulling the voltage level of the output end OUT to a low voltage level VSS after the output end OUT outputs a high level voltage. The sixth transistor Q6 and the tenth transistor Q10 are electrically connected to the driving node G, for pulling the voltage level of the driving node G to the low voltage level VSS to turn off the second transistor Q2, after the output end OUT outputs the high voltage level. The first pull-down module 110 and the second pull-down module 120 each approximately execute the pull down operation 50% of the time, according to the first signal CK1 and the second signal CK2 respectively. In the first pull-down module 110, the control ends of the ninth transistor Q9 and the tenth transistor Q10 are electrically connected to the node K. The voltage level of the node K is determined by the twelfth transistor Q12 and the thirteenth transistor Q13. In the second pull-down module 120, the control ends of the third transistor Q3 and the sixth transistor Q6 are electrically connected to the node P. The voltage level of the node P is determined by the fourth transistor Q4 and the fifth transistor Q5. The eleventh transistor Q11 is utilized to pull the voltage level of the node K to the low voltage level VSS. The seventh transistor Q7 is utilized to pull the voltage level of the node P to the low voltage level VSS when the output end OUT outputs the high voltage level. Furthermore, the eighth transistor Q8 is electrically connected to the node P, for pulling the voltage level of the node P to the low voltage level VSS when the output end OUT outputs the high voltage level.
The second signal CK2 is complementary to the first signal CK1; when the first signal CK1 is of the high voltage level and the second signal CK2 is of the low voltage level VSS, the voltage level of the node P is of the low voltage level VSS and the voltage level of the node K is of the high voltage level. However, the voltage level of the node K is pulled to the low voltage level VSS by the eleventh transistor Q11 except when the output end OUT outputs the high voltage level. Similarly, when the first signal CK1 is of the low voltage level VSS and the second signal CK2 is of the high voltage level, the voltage level of the node K is of the low voltage level VSS and the voltage level of the node P is of the high voltage level. However, the voltage level of the node P is pulled to the low voltage level VSS by the seventh transistor Q7 and the eighth transistor Q8 except when the output end OUT outputs the high voltage level.
The voltage level of the nodes K and P are maintained at the high voltage level approximately 50% of the time, and at the low voltage level VSS for the other 50% of the time. When at the high voltage level, the transistor is turned on and the threshold value of the transistor accordingly increases; when at the low voltage level, the threshold value of the transistor decreases. When the high voltage level is of an inverted value to the low voltage level, the increased magnitude of the threshold value is equivalent to the decreased magnitude of the threshold value; the net variation of the threshold value is approximately zero and the operation of the shift register is then considered as stable. However, the current conventional high voltage level is around +18V and the low voltage level VSS is around −6V. Therefore, the variation of the threshold values of the third transistor Q3, the sixth transistor Q6, the ninth transistor Q9 and the tenth transistor 10 controlled by the nodes K and P increases with time, causing the shift register to be unstable.


Sulfonated polyphenylene solid polymer electrolytes having high proton conductivity are provided, which are stable and which maintain high conductivity at temperatures of 100.degree. C. and above. These membranes are useful as solid polymer electrolytes for fuel cells and can be operated above the boiling point of water.

Solid polymer electrolytes, SPE's, are ionic polymers having very high ion conductivity. As electrolytes they are useful in electrochemical systems, primarily in batteries and fuel cells. The polymeric nature of SPE's makes them much easier to handle than liquid electrolytes. The physical construction of the electrochemical cell is greatly simplified with the use of SPE's since elaborate seals and containment systems are not needed to contain corrosive liquid electrolytes. The use of SPE's in fuel cells and batteries is well established in the art.
The use of solid polymer electrolytes can greatly simplify cell design. Liquid electrolytes must be confined with a separator and contained with seals. Liquid electrolytes are highly corrosive and more readily contaminated than solid electrolytes. Fuel and oxygen will diffuse across liquid electrolytes more readily, lowering efficiency. SPE's avoid these problems and can be made thinner, thereby lowering cell resistance. Handling of SPE's is much easier than handling liquid systems, and cell construction can be simpler.
Fuel cells with SPE's promise greater energy density than liquid electrolyte cells because of low overall weight, primarily due to simpler construction and thinner cells. The first fuel cells flown in the U.S. space program used sulfonated polystyrene SPE's, and SPE cells are still a choice for space missions. (Alkaline cells are also used.)
An SPE should have the following properties: (1) high ionic conductivity, (2) zero electronic conductivity, (3) very low permeability to gases, (4) chemical stability at the operating temperature, (5) mechanical strength, (6) low sensitivity to humidity, and (7) compatibility with catalyst.
The first of these is by far the most difficult to obtain. Current SPE's must be operated at temperatures and pressures where water is a liquid; otherwise, the membrane dehydrates, and proton conductivity is drastically reduced. Although byproduct water must be removed, care must be taken not to dry out the SPE. Water management is a major difficulty of currently available SPE's. Fuel and air streams must be pre-humidified, and temperature strictly limited to avoid dehydration. These extra control systems add significant weight and cost.
It would be highly advantageous to operate SPE fuel cells above the boiling point of water. This would greatly simplify water balance. Temperatures lower than about 80.degree. C. require active cooling with concomitant weight and cost. The key lies in development of an SPE with high proton conductivity in the absence of condensed water. The need for hydration with sulfonated polyfluorocarbon SPE's is a result of the relatively low concentration of sulfonate groups and the hydrophobic nature of the fluorocarbon backbone. The structure of perfluorosulfonated polymer membranes is such that the sulfonate groups tend to concentrate in a water rich phase, which forms a network permeating the hydrophobic fluorocarbon regions. When dehydrated, the sulfonate groups become isolated, and proton migration between groups is difficult.
There is therefore a need for SPE's which maintain high proton conductivity above the boiling point of water and in the absence of liquid water.

Sulfonated polymers for solid polymer electrolytes


A method for dressing a pair of weld gun tips on a weld gun controlled by a robot is disclosed. The method comprises the steps of: placing an alignment tool in a mounting head of a tip dresser tool, with the alignment tool including a central alignment bore having a diameter corresponding in size to a diameter of the pair of weld gun tips; teaching a robot path to cause the pair of weld gun tips to slide into the central alignment bore while the alignment tool is mounted in the mounting head; removing the alignment tool from the mounting head; inserting a cutter head into the mounting head; using the taught robot path to bring the pair of weld gun tips into contact with the cutter head; and dressing the weld gun tips with the cutter head.

The present invention relates generally to a tip dresser for robotically controlled weld gun tips, and more particularly to a tip dresser and an alignment tool for a weld gun tip dresser.
Robotically controlled weld guns are employed to weld metal parts together, such as welding body panels together on a vehicle. Such weld guns may have a pair of robotically controlled arms, with weld gun tips on each arm that are brought together on opposite sides of the material to be welded before performing the welding operation. These weld gun tips (copper weld caps) periodically need to be dressed. Dressing involves brining the pair of weld gun tips into contact with the cutting blades in a cutter head of a tip dresser tool. The cutter head is rotated, causing the blades to dress the weld gun tips (somewhat similar to sharpening a pencil in a pencil sharpener).
It is important, when dressing the weld gun tips, to assure proper alignment of the weld gun tips with the cutter head. If the tips are not aligned properly with the cutter head during this process, bad welds can result. A tradesman, then, who tries to assure that the alignment is proper relies on visual orientation of the tips to assure the tips are aligned with the center of the cutter head. However, the contour of the blades on the cutter head make it relatively difficult for the tradesman to tell when the tips are properly centered on the cutter head. If, after dressing the tips, it turns out that the weld gun tips are not aligned with the cutter head, the tradesman must then re-teach the robot path again, and try all over again until they are correctly centered. This trial and error process can be slow and thus costly. Consequently, it is desirable to have a better method of dressing the weld gun tips for a robotically controlled weld gun.


The method of recalibrating an energy management processor of a battery of accumulators consists, at the end of a defined period of time, in initiating a process of recalibration of evaluation of the quantity of electrical energy contained in the battery, in completely recharging the battery, in detecting the end of the complete recharge of the battery, in performing a partial discharge of the battery, in measuring the quantity of electricity extracted during this discharge, in leaving the battery to rest for a defined time, in totally discharging the battery at a low current while measuring the quantity of electricity thus extracted from the battery, in adding the said two quantities of electricity measured in order to obtain the value of the maximum capacity of the battery at the moment of the recalibration.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of recalibrating a battery energy management processor.
2. Discussion of the Background
A self-contained vehicle with electric traction can be used only in an urban area on condition of knowing, as accurately as possible, the remaining endurance which its traction accumulator batteries can provide it with. The reining endurance of the vehicle corresponds to the distance or to the time for which the car can drive before exhausting the electric charge contained in these traction accumulator batteries. Knowledge of the remaining endurance of the vehicle is derived from knowledge of two factors. The first of these factors, Which is subjective, concerns the consumption of the vehicle over the journeys to come. This consumption depends in particular on the profile of the route, on the density of the traffic and on the mode of driving by the driver. The second factor, which is objective, concerns the charge which is recoverable at any instant from the traction battery.
The current devices indicating the recoverable charge, called gauges, are based on a measurement of the voltage at the terminals of the battery (Curtis-type devices, etc.). The accuracy of these devices is lower than 20% of the rated capacity for a new battery, and degrades considerably as a function of aging: the estimation error may exceed 50%.
Other devices are known, which here will be called "battery energy management processors", which measure the quantities of electricity alternately extracted and stored in the batteries managed by these processors, as well as the alteration in the maximum capacity of the batteries throughout their life. The evaluation of the quantities of energy actually stored in the batteries is only approximated, since the algorithm used is based on a weighted algebraic sum of the electrical current strengths measured in series with the managed batteries, and since the value of the maximum capacity of the batteries alters considerably as a function of the age and of the random aspects of use of the batteries. The errors made in each term of the algebraic sum (measurement errors, but also errors in the calculation of the energy actually stored by the charges, or available for discharges, and in the maximum capacity) cause the accuracy of the prediction of the available energy quantity to drift over time.

Method of recalibrating a battery energy management processor


A batting practice device includes a base which may be secured to a chain-link fence without the use of tools, an adjustable-length rigid arm fixed to the base and extending generally perpendicularly thereto, and a tethered free-swinging ball supported from an end of the rigid arm opposite the base. The base includes a primary support bar configured to slip between adjacent wire portions of the chain-link fence and to securely hook-on thereto, and a stabilizing crossbar generally perpendicular to the primary support bar. The rigid arm includes a first arm member rigidly fixed to the base, and a second arm member that telescopes with respect to the first arm member for the purpose of adjusting the length of the rigid arm. The ball is attached to a reinforced line which extends through the second end of the rigid arm. The length of the reinforced line is adjustable, and extends from the second end of the rigid arm centrally therethrough to the base.

This invention relates generally to sports devices designed for sharpening skills involving swinging at a ball while it is midair. More specifically, the present invention relates to a device which allows a baseball player to practice batting in a relatively confined space.
It is generally agreed that the most important factors in hitting a baseball well are timing, watching the ball and knowing the strike zone. Like any other sport, baseball requires constant practice. However, it is difficult in many cases for a batter to get as much practice as he needs to become really proficient. Even after a baseball player has acquired a level swing and developed a level of proficiency at batting, his batting skills must be continuously reinforced in order that the player maintain the best batting record during competitive play.
Batting practice, of course, is a time-honored pre-game activity, and additional attention is devoted to it during most practice sessions. Pitching machines have made it possible for a baseball player to get more of the practice necessary to develop a proper stance and a good swing. In both cases, however, the practice sessions require not only the batting practice pitcher or the pitching machine, but a baseball diamond and outfielders to retrieve the batted balls.
In many situations it is desirable to provide some means for a ball player to work on his hitting, and particularly his stance and swing, in a limited or confined space and in a manner which does not require that the ball be retrieved after each swing. In an effort to provide such a practice system, a number of devices have been developed. Although these prior devices, which generally provide some type of support structure rigidly fixed to a wall, fence or pole and which support a tethered ball, perform generally satisfactorily when use as intended, they each suffer drawbacks which make them less than ideal for routine, everyday use by individuals and baseball teams. For example, many of the prior baseball batting practice devices must be rigidly fixed to a wall or fence prior to use in a manner which makes it virtually impossible to conveniently set up the practice device when needed, take it down after the batting practice and then transport the practice device to another location.
Accordingly, there has been a need for a novel baseball batting practice device which can be quickly and easily mounted to and removed from chain link fences which typically surrounding portions of baseball fields. Additionally, such a novel batting practice device is needed which may be configured to fit within standard baseball equipment bags for transport from one location to another. Moreover, a baseball batting practice device is needed which, after it is placed onto a wall or fence, may be adjusted to meet the needs of a particular batter. The present invention fulfills these needs and provides other related advantages.


Neural network systems (100) with learning and recall are applied to clustered multiple-featured data (122,124,126) and analog data.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to computation, and, more particularly, to neural network information and signal processing.
2. Description of the Related Art.
Avionics sensor systems typically are confronted with the problem of identifying the emitters of various electromagnetic signals (i.e., radar pulses) being received. The known sensor systems typically include an antenna, a preprocessor, a pulse buffer, a digital signal processor, and a classifier. The antenna receives signals from various emitters with various frequencies, pulse widths, pulse repetition rates, locations, and so forth. The antenna output is preprocessed to extract a set of features for each received pulse. The set of features is processed by standard signal processing methods to cluster the pulses from each perceived emitter, and the classifier compares the features of each perceived emitter with pre-stored data to determine its identity. All of this analysis would take place in a homing missle which would then decide which of the perceived emitters to attack. However, the known sensor systems have the problem of extracting the emitter identity information from the mass of incoming pulses; the computing power required for standard digital signal processing in real time cannot be effectively put into every homing missle.
Attempts to understand the functioning of the human brain have led to various "neural network" models in which large numbers of neurons are interconnected. These models roughly presume each neuron exists in one of two states (quiescent and firing) with the state determined by the states of connected nuerons (if enough connected neurons are firing, then the original neuron should be in the firing state); and the thrust of the models is to perform computations such as pattern recognition with the neural networks. The models may be simple feedforward layered structures with an input layer of neurons, one or more hidden layers of neurons, and an output layer of neurons. Other models have feedback among the neurons and correspondingly more involved behavior.
J. Hopfield, Neural Networks and Physical Systems with Emergent Collective Computational Abilities, 79 Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 2554 (1982) describes a neural network model with N neurons each of which has the value 0 or 1 (corresponding to quiescent and to firing), so the state of the network is then a N-component vector V=[V.sub.1, V.sub.2, . . . , V.sub.N ]of O's and 1's which depends upon time. The neuron interconnections are described by a matrix T.sub.i,j defining the influence of the j.sup.th neuron on the i.sup.th neuron. The state of the network evolves in time as follows: each neuron i has a fixed threshold .theta..sub.i and readjusts its state V.sub.i randomly in time by setting V.sub.i equal to 0 or 1 depending on whether ##EQU1## is negative or positive. All neurons have the same average rate of readjustment, and the readjustments define a dynamic flow in state space.
With the assumption that T.sub.i,j is symmetric, the potential function ##EQU2## can be used to show that the flow of the network is to local minima of the potential function. Further, with a given set of uncorrelated N-component vectors U.sup.1, U.sup.2, . . . , U.sup.8, a T.sub.i,j can be defined by ##EQU3## and with the thresholds equal to 0, these U.sup.k are the fixed points of the flow and thus stable states of the network. This is a type of "outer product storage" of the vectors U.sup.1, U.sup.2, . . . , U.sup.8. Such a network can act as a content-addressable memory as follows: the memories to be stored in the network are used to construct the U.sup.k and hence T.sub.i,j, so the stored memories are fixed points of the flow. Then a given partial memory is input by using it to define the initial state of the network, and the state will flow usually to the closest fixed point/stable state U.sup.k which is then the memory recalled upon input of the partial memory.
Further analysis and modified network models appear in, for example, J. Hopfield et al, Computing with Neural Circuits: A Model, 233 Science 625 (1986) and J. Hopfield, Neurons with Graded Response Have Collective Computational Properties like Those of Two-State Neurons, 81 Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 3088 (1984).
L. Cooper, A Possible Organization of Animal Memory and Learning, Proc. Nobel Symp. Coll. Prop. Phys. Sys. 252 (Academic, New York 1973) observes that the modelling of neural network for animal memory and learning has the problem of mapping events in the animal's environment (i.e., sensory output) to signal distributions in the animal's neurons with the fundamental property of preserving closeness or separateness (in some sense not yet completely defined) of the events. That is, with a vector representation of the neural network states, two events as similar as a white cat and a gray cat should map into vectors which are close to parallel while two events as different as the sound of a bell and the sight of food should map into vectors that are close to orthogonal. Note that standard analysis, such as described in Gonzalez and Wintz, Digital Image Processing (Addison-Wesley 1977), does not use neural network computation and does not have this problem; rather, the standard analysis attempts to extract features and categorize by serial number crunching.
J. Anderson, Cognitive Capabilities of a Parallel System, NATO Advanced Research Workshop (Mar. 3, 1985) describes the Brain State in a Box (BSB) neural network model which includes outerproduct storage, Widrow-Hoff learning, and a ramped-threshold recall algorithm. That is, the matrix of interconnection strengths, T.sub.i,j, is modified to learn a new vector V.sub.j by ##EQU4## where .eta. is a learning constant and N is number of neurons. The learning constant is roughly the inverse of the number of times the matrix must be trained on a given vector before it fully learns the vector. The smaller the learning constant, the finer the resolution of the average direction for a learned state but the more times the input vectors must be trained. The learning procedure saturates when .DELTA.T.sub.i,j is close to zero, which implies that the vector is close to being an eigenvector of the matrix with an eigenvalue near 1.
Recall of a learned (stored) vector given an input vector U.sub.j is by the following interative process that converges towards an eigenvector: ##EQU5## where the "Limit" function clamps the values in the range from -1 to 1. The constants .gamma. and .beta. measure the feedback and signal decay in the algorithm. This synchronous recall algorithm replaces the dynamic flow of the Hopfield model. The usual applications of the BSB neural network such as data bases with words and letters encoded as their ASCII representations require binary neurons as in the first Hopfield model.


This invention generally provides a class of novel cationic resin comprised of a cross-linked polyamine having pendant tertiary and/or quaternary amine groups linked to amine groups in said polyamine by a hydrocarbon chain including a hydroxyl group in the .beta.-position with respect to the polyamine chain. In general, these resins can comprise the reaction product of a polyamine having secondary amine groups, a crosslinking agent, and a cationizing agent having an epoxide group and a tertiary or quaternary amine (quaternary ammonium) group. These cationic resins have been found to be useful for a variety of operations in the manufacture of paper and paperboard, especially as drainage aids and stabilizers for dispersed rosin sizing agents.

1. The Field of the Invention
The invention described relates primarily to novel polyamines that are useful in the manufacture of paper and paperboard; more particularly, it relates to a cationic resin comprising a cross-linked polyamine containing secondary amine groups and having pendant from at least some of the secondary amine groups a tertiary or quaternary amine groups. This invention also relates to dispersed fortified rosin sizing agents including these novel polyamines as stabilizers for the dispersion, and to drainage aids incorporating these novel resins.
2. The State of the Art
Paper and related paper products are made from cellulosic fibers. In paper and paperboard processing, present high speed machines generally include a web (i.e., a porous conveyor) moving at speeds on the order of one kilometer per minute. A dilute suspension of cellulosic fibers is furnished and accelerated during application to the web; that is, effectively the "furnish" is sprayed onto the web. After a distance of about 50 m from the spraying operation, a vacuum is applied to the bottom side of the web to drain water from the suspension and produce a wet laid paper sheet. Generally, the solids content of the furnish is 1-4 wt. %, which is increased by dewatering to about 40 wt. %. Thereafter, this wet sheet is dried to form finished paper and paperboard. The water that is drained from this stock dispersion during the formation of the wet laid paper sheet may be recycled to the stock preparation plant for reuse in the preparation of additional quantities of the paper stock dispersion.
Modern paper mills tend to close their water systems in order to lower economic costs and lower environmental contamination by minimizing both the amount of polluted water released from the mill and the make-up fresh water taken into the mill. Additionally, compounds such as fillers, dyes, sizing agents, wet and dry strength-enhancing resins, retention aids, defoamers, and other additives are widely used in manufacturing paper and paperboard. These additives are now typically added to the low solids paper stock dispersion or to various subsequent stages of processing (termed "internal" incorporation of the additive) rather than to the finished product (an "external" addition). The water in such a closed mill system tends to become loaded with cellulose fines and these chemical additives, which soon begin to reduce the rate of dewatering. Chemicals generically termed drainage aids have been developed to accelerate the dewatering of these stock dispersions. While drainage aids may be used in open water systems, their greater utility is found in closed water systems to accelerate dewatering and to speed up the paper machine towards maximizing paper production. The efficiencies of drainage aids vary with the particular type of paper furnish used; the furnish may vary between the extremes of a 100% virgin furnish to a 100% waste paper furnish.
The effects of the various chemical additives on the dewatering process on paper and board machines have been widely investigated. Kartovaara reported in Zellstoff Paperforschungainst (SF-00101, Helsinki, Finland) that a nonionic and an anionic polymer such as a polyoxyethylene and a carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) impair the dewatering of a wet paper web made from secondary and sulphate pulps in wet pressing, whereas cationic polymers, e.g., cationic starch and polyethyleneimine, accelerate the dewatering. However, differential scanning calorimetric measurements indicated that these two cationic polymers work in different ways. The effect of the cationic starch was shown to be retained even at long pressing times indicating that its effect on the change of filtration resistance of the wet paper web is not reduced. The effect of the polyethyleneimine on the wet pressing disappeared with increasing pressing time because its effect is combined with the filtration properties of the wet web.
Cationic starches have been made using different cationizing agents. German OLS (Offenlegungsschrift) 3604796 discloses the use of the following cationizing agents for starch: ##STR1## where R.sub.1, R.sub.2 and R.sub.3 are C.sub.1-4 alkyl, n is 1-3, and X is Cl, Br, AcO (acetate), or sulphate. These cationizing agents have been used also with polyvinyl alcohol (DE 3626662) to yield dry strength additives for paper, and with galactomannans (DE 3604795) to yield other products useful in paper manufacture.
Cationizing agents of a similar type have been used with carboxylate polymers as in EP-A 187,281 to yield cationic water soluble polymers said to be useful as flocculation and filtration agents in paper manufacture. These same cationizing agents have been used with cellulose to form products useful in antistatic paper coatings (JP Kokai 79-87787), with lignosulphonic acid to form emulsifying agents for asphalt (DE OLS 2,218,144), with methacrylyloxypropylammonium salts to form sizing and wet strength agents for paper and textiles (U.S. Pat. No. 3,347,832), and with methacrylamide based polymers to form flocculents and oil well drilling additives (EP-A 156,646).
Polyethyleneimine and derivatives of polyethyleneimine are well known as drainage and retention aids in the manufacture of paper. German OLS 3519357 describes products prepared by the reaction of polyethyleneimine with polyvinyl alcohol and aldehydes.
It is known that drainage and retention aids can be made by crosslinking both polyamines and polyamidoamines. German OLS 1,570,296 discloses products made by crosslinking polyamines with epichlorohydrin. German OLS 1,795,392 discloses products made by reacting polyamidoamines with bifunctional crosslinking agents which are prepared by reacting a bis-tert-amine or a secondary amine with epichlorohydrin. German OLS 2434816 discloses a process for manufacturing paper additives wherein polyamidoamines, to which ethyleneimine is optionally grafted, are reacted with .alpha.,.omega.-dichlorohydrin ethers of polyalkylene oxides (i.e., having chlorine on each end of the molecule).
U.S. Pat. No. 2,926,116 and U.S. Pat. No. 2,926,154 describe a cationic thermosetting polyamide-epichlorohydrin resin and its use as a wet strength enhancer in paper making. The resin is formed by reacting a dicarboxylic acid with a polyalkylene polyamine to produce --NH(C.sub.n H.sub.2n NH).sub.x --CORCO--, wherein n and x are each 2 or more and R is the divalent organic radical of the dicarboxylic acid, and thereafter reacting that polymer with epichlorohydrin. An example of such wet strength resins is one derived from adipic acid and diethylenetriamine, --[--NHCH.sub.2 CH.sub.2 --NH--CH.sub.2 CH.sub.2 NH--CO--(CH.sub.2).sub.4 --CO--].sub.x --, and then reacted with epichlorohydrin to produce ##STR2## which is then heated to provide a polymer of the form ##STR3## The heterocyclic quaternary amine group is referred to as an azetidinium ring.
The art is thus still concerned with the problem of providing chemical additives which function especially in the neutral to alkaline pH regime for making paper and paperboard. ("Paperboard" is generally considered a lower grade paper product, such as used for making various types of "cardboard".) As noted for closed water systems, additives tend to accumulate in the water, including those additives intended to be incorporated into the paper product but which are not entirely fixed in the wet laid sheet.
Another additive commonly used in the manufacture of paper products is a sizing agent. Sizing is typically accomplished by adding a rosin-based sizing composition at one or more selected points in the paper machine, after which papermaker's alum (aluminum sulfate, or a similar salt) is commonly added to the sheet to precipitate the sizing agent onto the cellulosic fibers. This general technique of using a rosin-based sizing agent and alum has been practiced for many decades. However, the technique operates satisfactorily only at pH values lying between about 4 and 6; there exist cellulose pulps which are difficult to size under these pH conditions.
Another consideration with acid sizing is that paper made under acidic conditions not only develops less dry strength but, over time, the strength of the paper decreases. Yet another consideration in processing in such a system is acid-induced corrosion of the papermaking apparatus. Accumulation of acid is a particular concern with modern plants that recycle the drained water.
To accomplish sizing in a higher pH regime, some artisans have employed reactive sizes, such as alkyl ketene dimer or alkyl succinyl anhydride. Still, there are methods of using rosin-based sizes at more neutral pH conditions.
Rosins used in sizing compositions are usually comprised of wood rosin, gum rosin, tall oil rosin, or some mixture thereof. The rosin may be "fortified" by reaction with, for example, fumaric acid to form the fortified rosin (a Diels-Alder adduct of the original rosin).
U.S. Pat. No. 3,186,900 discloses a sizing composition used in the pH range of 6.0 to 7.5. These sizes comprise a relatively small amount of alum and a preblend of rosin size and a cationic polyamide-epichlorohydrin resin.
British Pat. No. 1,266,829 describes high-free-rosin emulsion sizes having 80-98% of the total solids weight comprising an unsaponified rosin. These sizes are used in the pH regime of 6.0-7.5. The composition also includes a water-soluble cellulose-substantive cationic polyamine, such as polyethylene imine, cationic starches polyvinylamine, polyvinylpyridine, poly(N-methyl pyridinium) chloride, urea-formaldehyde-poly-alkylene-polyamine, and aminopolyamide-epichlorohydrin resins.
EP-B-074,544 describes the preparation of fortified rosin dispersions in aqueous media, particularly a mixture of two dispersions based respectively on rosin and alkyl ketene dimer.
EP-292,975 discloses a cationic rosin size particularly for increasing the resistance to penetration of liquid packaging board by aggressive penetrants through ingress at the edges of the packaging board.
EP-208,667 discloses the use of a cationic surfactant in the preparation of rosin and synthetic size mixtures which are described as having a lower softening point than the original rosin, and so taught as spreading better on the fibers.
EP-A-333,368 discloses a method for sizing paper at a neutral or alkaline pH with rosin, an aluminum compound, and a cationic or anionic polyelectrolyte. The method comprises preparing and applying a preblend of the size just prior to use.
There are numerous examples of stable rosin dispersions using anionic or nonionic surfactants, whereby the fixation of the hydrophobic rosin size to the pulp fibers is augmented by the concomitant use of cationic polymers, such as starch, polyamines polyamide epihalohydrin polymers, and cationized polyacrylamides. Exemplary compositions are described, for example, in JP 61-113898 and EP 259671.
GB 2,159,183 discloses mixtures of rosin dispersion and aluminum polyhydroxy chloride. These mixtures rely for their cationicity on the formation of a stable flocculent resulting from the reversal of charge in the double layer of the colloidal particles in the dispersion.
JP-A-3294596 discloses a cationic rosin sizing agent emulsified with a polyamide-polyamine epichlorohydrin resin having hydrophobic groups. The sizing agent is used in neutral pH paper manufacturing, and is more particularly synthesized from (a) polyalkylenepolyamines, (b) dicarboxylic acids or derivatives, (c) epichlorohydrin, and at least one hydrophobic group-introducing compound selected from (d-1) monobasic carboxylic acids, their anhydrides, and their ester, (d-2) alkylamines, (d-3) alkyl ketene dimer, (d-4) alkyl- or alkenylsuccinic anhydrides, (d-5) alkylene oxides, (d-6) organic halides, and (d-7) terpenoids and derivatives.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,036,821 describes a process for the production of basic, storage-stable polyaminoamides and retention agents for fillers and pigments, drainage accelerators, and effluent-treating agents in the manufacture of paper. The process essentially comprises (a) reacting a polyfunctional compound (e.g., epichlorohydrin) with a tertiary, monofunctional amine (e.g., e.g., trimethylamine) to form an ammonium compound, and then (b) reacting the ammonium compound with the secondary amino groups in a basic polyaminoamide derived from (i) a dicarboxylic acid, (ii) a polyalkylenepolyamine, and (iii) an amino carboxylic acid or a lactam.

Cationic compounds useful as drainage aids and stabilizers for rosin-based sizing agents


A retractor and a surgical tool are positioned within a cannula, and a dissection cradle of the retractor is positioned at the distal end of the cannula. The retractor includes a dissection cradle that is resiliently supported along an axis skewed relative to the axis of the cannula. The dissection cradle, in operation, is extended to cradle the target vessel, and the retractor may be fully extended to urge the vessel away from the axis of the cannula to isolate a side branch for exposure to a surgical tool. The retractor includes a hollow support and a spray nozzle disposed in the distal end of the retractor to form an irrigation system and lens washer that can be selectively positioned to direct the spray of irrigation fluid at a remote surgical site or at an endoscopic lens.

Endoscopic surgery allows a surgeon to perform safe and successful procedures because of the surgeon's ability to view the surgical site through the endoscope lens. For some surgical procedures, such as dissection, the cannula housing the endoscope has a transparent blunt dissection tip through which the surgeon views the surgical site. The blunt dissection tip protects the endoscope lens from being smeared by blood or fatty tissue present at the surgical site, or from being fogged due to the moist subcutaneous environment. However, many surgical procedures cannot be performed using a blunt dissection tip. When side branches and vessel ends of a vessel must be transected to harvest the vessel, the end of the cannula must be open to allow the surgical tools to extend from the cannula. When the cannula end is open, the endoscope lens is subject to the adverse conditions described above. The surgeon is forced to repeatedly remove the cannula from the body to clean the endoscope lens. This increases the length and risks of the operation.
Some conventional schemes for cleaning an endoscope lens rely upon an endoscope with a cleaning system built within it. However, having a cleaning system within the endoscope restricts the angle of incidence at which the cleaning fluid may be propelled toward the lens to almost parallel to the lens. This results in a less effective cleansing action. Also, since the spray is being directed parallel to the lens, the surgeon cannot see the spray source and it is therefore difficult to adjust the direction of the spray. Thus, with these systems, the endoscope must still be removed on occasion for manual cleaning where the proper angle of incident spray can be obtained manually. Additionally, in procedures using gas insufflation, the gas may dry out a target vessel or other surgical site. In these situations, it is often necessary to irrigate the vessel to prevent the vessel from drying out. However, conventional endoscope washing systems are not capable of providing both endoscope lens cleaning and remote surgical site irrigation. Therefore, a remote endoscopic washing system would be desirable for more effectively cleansing the endoscope lens during a surgical procedure by allowing the surgeon to control the angle at which cleansing fluid is sprayed as well as allowing the surgeon to use the same apparatus to irrigate the surgical site itself.

Cannula-based surgical instrument and method


The invention relates to an active matrix liquid crystal display device which uses a switching device to control a pixel, and an object is to provide a liquid crystal display device which has an excellent viewing angle property and high brightness and a fabrication method of the same. A TFT substrate has a structure which reduces the film thickness of a protective insulating film in a control capacitance part in which control capacitance is formed and the film thickness of a protective insulating film in an auxiliary capacitance part in which auxiliary capacitance is formed thinner than the film thickness of a protective insulating film which covers a TFT and the other elements.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an active matrix liquid crystal display device which uses a switching device to control pixels.
2. Description of the Related Art
A liquid crystal display device generally widely available is in TN liquid crystal mode. A TN liquid crystal display device has a disadvantage that its viewing angle property is not better than that of a CRT. Liquid crystal display devices in IPS (In-Plane Switching) mode and MVA (Multi-domain Vertical Alignment) mode having an improved viewing angle property are developed, and are widely used as a display unit for electronic devices. In these devices, in an MVA liquid crystal display device, a protrusion in a bank shape or a recess in a slit shape is disposed in a pixel on at least one of a TFT substrate on which a switching device (TFT) is formed to control a liquid crystal pixel or a common substrate on which a color filter is formed. The protrusion or the recess controls the alignment of liquid crystal molecules. In the MVA liquid crystal display device, the alignment is split (multi-domain) by utilizing its property that the tilt directions of the liquid crystal molecules are varied on both sides of the protrusion (or the recess), and thus a wide viewing angle property can be implemented.
In the MVA liquid crystal display device before, a phenomenon occurs in which a screen looks whitish when it is viewed from an oblique direction. FIG. 15 shows a T-V (transmittance to voltage) property when a screen is viewed from the front side (a curve connecting solid diamonds), and a T-V property when the screen is viewed from the direction at an angle of 60 degrees upward with respect to the front side (a curve connecting asterisks) where the horizontal axis is the applied voltage (V), and the vertical axis is the transmittance. As shown in the area circled in FIG. 15, the transmittance viewed from the oblique direction is higher than the transmittance viewed from the front side when voltage slightly higher than a threshold voltage is applied to a pixel electrode. In addition, when the applied voltage becomes higher to some extent, the transmittance viewed from the oblique direction is lower than the transmittance viewed from the front side. On this account, when the screen is viewed from the oblique direction, the brightness difference in a red pixel, a green pixel and a blue pixel becomes small. Consequently, as described above the phenomenon occurs that the screen looks whitish. This phenomenon is called discolor. Discolor occurs in the MVA liquid crystal display device as well as in the TN liquid crystal display device.
For a scheme to solve this phenomenon, there is a method in which a pixel electrode is split into two areas, a switching device is connected to the pixel electrode in one of the areas to directly apply data voltage (data signal), and data voltage is applied to the pixel electrode in the other area through capacitance. In the pixel area to which data voltage is applied through capacitance, the capacitance ratio to the liquid crystal capacitance determines the voltage to be applied to liquid crystals, and this voltage is different from the voltage to be applied to the pixel area to which data voltage is directly applied. Thus, the phenomenon shown in FIG. 15 is suppressed that the transmittance viewed from the oblique direction is higher than the transmittance viewed from the front side, and consequently, the phenomenon is also suppressed that the screen looks whitish (discolor). As described above, the method in which a single pixel is split into a plurality of areas and the pixel areas capacitively coupled are used to improve the display property is called a half tone gray scale method by capacitive coupling (capacitive coupling HT method).
FIGS. 16A and 16B show the configuration of a single pixel of a TFT substrate of a conventional MVA liquid crystal display device before using the capacitive coupling HT method. FIG. 16A shows a plan layout depicting a single pixel. FIG. 16B shows a cross section sectioned at a phantom line A-A′ shown in FIG. 16A. Although not shown in the drawing, the MVA liquid crystal display device actually has the structure in which vertical alignment liquid crystals are sealed and sandwiched between a TFT substrate 101 and a common substrate (not shown) on which a color filter and other elements are laminated. For the sake of easy understanding, protrusions 61, 62 and 63 in a bank shape are additionally shown in FIG. 16A. The protrusions are formed on the common substrate side to control the alignment of liquid crystal molecules. In the liquid crystal display device, a multi-domain is formed of the protrusions 61, 62 and 63 and a recess that is formed of a space having a slope at an angle of 45 degrees between pixel electrodes 51 and 52 on the TFT substrate 101 side.
As shown in FIGS. 16A and 16B, on a glass substrate 100, a gate bus line 10 and an auxiliary capacitance bus line 11 are arranged in parallel with each other, which are formed of Ti, for example. An insulating film 20 formed of SiN is formed over throughout the front surface thereon. The gate bus line 10 is partially used as a gate electrode of a TFT 5 which switches a liquid crystal pixel. In the area of the TFT 5, an operative semiconductor layer 21 is formed which is made of amorphous silicon, and an impurity layer 22 is formed which is made of amorphous silicon doped with phosphorus. The insulating film 20 on the gate electrode functions as a gate insulating film. The following are formed of materials such as Al: a data bus line 31 which is orthogonal to the gate bus line 10 through the insulating film 20, a drain electrode 32 which is connected to the data bus line 31, a source electrode 33 which is disposed on the operative semiconductor layer 21 and faces the drain electrode 32 at a predetermined space, and control electrodes 35a, 35b and 35c which are connected to the source electrode 33. A protective insulating film 40 which is made of SiN is formed over throughout the front surface thereof.
A contact hole 41 is opened in the protective insulating film 40, and the control electrode 35a is electrically connected to the pixel electrode 51 in a first area and formed thereabove through the contact hole 41. In addition, the protective insulating film 40 is opened in terminal lead parts of the gate bus line 10, the auxiliary capacitance bus line 11 and the data bus line 31 outside a display area, not shown. In the gate bus line 10 and the auxiliary capacitance bus line 11, the insulating film 20 is also opened. The pixel electrodes 51 and 52 are formed of a transparent electrode such as ITO. The pixel electrode 52 is in a second area and separated from the pixel electrode 51 in the first area. The pixel electrode 52 is capacitively coupled to the control electrodes 35a, 35b and 35c through the protective insulating film 40. Thus, the capacitive coupling HT method is implemented, and discolor can be suppressed in the liquid crystal display device when viewed from the oblique direction. In addition, auxiliary capacitance is formed by the auxiliary capacitance bus line 11, the pixel electrodes 51 and 52 as well as the insulating film 20 and the protective insulating film 40 which are sandwiched therebetween.
Patent Reference: JP-Application-No. 2004-106138
In the capacitive coupling HT method, the control electrodes 35b and 35c are particularly required which are capacitively coupled to the pixel electrode 52 in the second area. The control electrodes 35b and 35c are formed at the same time when the data bus line 31, the drain electrode 32 and the source electrode 33 are fabricated in order not to increase the number of fabrication process steps, and they need an area to some extent to provide required control capacitance. The data bus line 31 is demanded to have a low resistance value to some extent because of a problem of a time constant when data voltage is written to a pixel, and thus metal such as Al is used for the data bus line 31. Therefore, for a transmissive liquid crystal display device, the control electrodes 35b and 35c overlapped with the pixel electrode 52 in the second area are the areas that light is not transmitted. On this account, a problem arises that the aperture ratio of the pixel is reduced and the brightness of a display device is dropped.
The liquid crystal display device needs auxiliary capacitance regardless of the use of the capacitive coupling HT method. Generally, the liquid crystals are driven at alternate current. However, a shift occurs in the effective voltage that is applied to liquid crystals depending on the cases in which a pixel is written at a positive voltage and it is written at a negative voltage. In order to relax the shift in the effective voltage and to prevent a phenomenon of image sticking or flickering in a display screen, auxiliary capacitance is provided in each pixel in the magnitude that is one to several times the liquid crystal capacitance. As shown in FIGS. 16A and 16B, auxiliary capacitance is formed at the area where the auxiliary capacitance bus line 11, the pixel electrodes 51 and 52 are overlapped with each other. In order to obtain a predetermined capacitance value, the area of the overlapping part is needed to some extent, and it is required to thicken the auxiliary capacitance bus line 11 and other schemes. Consequently, the auxiliary capacitance bus line 11 formed of metal such as Ti causes a reduction in the aperture ratio of the pixel.

Liquid crystal display device comprising a surface of the pixel electrode on an insulating film in the area where the auxiliary capacitance is formed is uneven


An exterior accessory assembly or module for a vehicle door assembly comprises an exterior rearview mirror and/or door cap assembly, which may further include a cover member, a door handle, window frame, window seal and/or an exterior rearview mirror assembly. The vehicle door assembly includes a door frame, which includes a cap and/or mirror mounting region, a lock and/or latch mechanism, a mirror connector, electronic controls, regulators, trim pieces, and/or the like, and is mountable to a vehicle at the vehicle assembly plant as a single unit. The exterior rearview mirror and/or the cap assembly may mount to the modular door and provide an exterior rearview mirror, a window frame and/or door handle. The exterior mirror and/or cap assembly and door frame may include corresponding electrical connectors for connecting electrical accessories of the accessory module to a door wiring or harness.

This invention relates generally to vehicle door assemblies and, more particularly, to an exterior accessory module, such as an exterior rearview mirror and/or door handle assembly, which is mountable on a door for a vehicle.
Exterior rearview mirrors are mounted at one or both sides of a vehicle to provide a driver of the vehicle with a view rearwardly and sidewardly of the vehicle. The mirror assemblies may comprise a mirror or head portion and a mounting portion, which is secured to the side of the vehicle. The head portion may be movable to break away from the mounting portion and fold along the side of the vehicle, and may even be a power folding mirror assembly which is foldable along the side of the vehicle in response to a control within the vehicle.
Typically, mirror manufacturers provide the complete mirror assembly, including the head and mounting portions, to the vehicle assembly plant. The mirror assembly may also be painted or colored by the mirror manufacturer, in order to avoid masking concerns at the vehicle assembly plant. The mirror assembly is attached to the side of the door or to a trim piece or sail secured alongside the door or window. The mirror assembly is installed to the door panel of the vehicle door at the vehicle assembly plant as the body of the vehicle travels along the assembly line.
Handles for the doors are also typically provided by the door manufacturer and are specific to each particular door, depending on the color and/or style of the door. The handles are installed to the door frame along with the external skin or outer cover of the door. Because the styles and colors of the handles may vary between applications, especially if the handle is molded in color to match a paint color that will be painted on the door at the vehicle assembly plant, this results in additional part numbers for each door assembly having a different handle style and/or color, even though the internal door frame and/or unpainted external covers of the doors may be common parts.
Recently, vehicle manufacturers have desired modular door assemblies to be assembled remotely from the vehicle assembly line and provided to the vehicle assembly plant as a single unit. The modular doors comprise the door frame, door body and door panels, and preferably include some or all of the accessories for the doors, such as the handle and lock mechanisms, windows and window mechanisms, speakers, lights, regulators, hinge components, accessory controls or switches, such as controls for adjusting windows, locks, seats, mirrors, cabin temperature settings and the like, trim pieces and exterior mirrors and the like. It is desirable for the modular door manufacturer to supply a variety of door and vehicle models and designs using a common door frame or chassis. The various components and panels are typically secured about the door frame to complete the door assembly. The modular doors are shipped to the vehicle assembly plant as a single unit and installed to the vehicle body on the assembly line. This allows a single manufacturer to manufacture the door module and requires less operator processes in the vehicle assembly plant.
Although the modular doors provide significant benefits to the vehicle manufacturer, exterior mirror assemblies have heretofore presented particular problems with the modular door approach. This is because exterior mirrors may protrude significantly outwardly from the side of the modular door, thus causing difficulties in packaging and shipping the modular doors to the assembly line. Furthermore, the mirror head portions and also the mounting portions are typically painted by the mirror manufacturer before installing the mirror assembly to the vehicle in order to avoid masking concerns.
Additional issues arise when mirror assemblies are provided with various optional accessories, such as exterior temperature sensors, security lights, motors or actuators for adjusting the reflector and/or the housing of the mirror relative to the vehicle, and the like. The additional options within the mirror assemblies lead to further parts proliferation of the modular doors, since each different mirror assembly or option associated therewith requires each modular door upon which it is installed to have a separate part number or code for the vehicle assembly plant. This number is then different from the other modular doors shipped to the assembly plant, which may otherwise be substantially identical in construction.
Many automobile manufacturers today prefer to assemble "skeletons" of the vehicle (i.e. the structural frame of the doors and body), and add the interior and exterior components to the frame as the frame moves along the assembly line. Typically, the door frames of the vehicle are stamped and installed to the vehicle as part of the "body in white" of the vehicle. The trim, glass, and other interior and exterior components are added later as the vehicle proceeds down the assembly line. However, it is difficult to add many of the components to the doors, since the components are typically installed from the interior of the vehicle. Some doors receive an interior modular cassette on their interior sides. However, the cassettes include interior components only and may include speakers, window regulators, window crank mechanisms, motors, shields or the like. In some cases, due to the space constraints within the vehicle and access to the components of the doors, the doors are removed from the vehicle after painting, in order to facilitate assembly of the doors, and then reinstalled to the respective vehicle further down the assembly line. This is an expensive and labor intensive process since the door must be installed to the vehicle twice. Further, the door assemblies then require a separate conveyor assembly line to move the doors through the assembly stations apart from the vehicle.
Additionally, the upper structural frame around the window, and the door body frame, and maybe even the exterior metal of the door, are often part of a unibody construction of the door, whereby the door body frame and window frame are formed from a single stamped part. The entire door and window frame is then mounted on the vehicle for assembly of the accessories and panels thereto. The installation of the window guides and/or seals is typically performed from inside the vehicle, thereby making the process difficult, due to space constraints and access to the components. Often, even the exterior mirror is secured to the door via fasteners from the interior side of the door. Additionally, the unibody construction of the doors is expensive to make or stamp as a single item.
Therefore, there is a need in the art for an improved process of assembling vehicle doors at the vehicle assembly plant or remote therefrom. The process should allow easy installation of various exterior accessories to a common frame, in order to avoid proliferation of parts within the vehicle or door assembly plant.

Exterior accessory module for vehicular modular door


An elevator system in which a car travels upward and downward among a plurality of floors. The elevator system includes terminals each having a wireless transmitting/receiving unit. One of the terminals is correspondingly provided for at least one of the plurality of floors and another of the terminals is correspondingly provided for the car and at least one of a counterweight. A mobile terminal is provided which enables wireless transmitting/receiving of signals between the terminals which are arranged within a predetermined distance of each other.

The present invention relates to an elevator system in which information is transmitted and received by wireless transmission between an elevator control unit and terminals in an elevator car and on each of the floors serviced by the elevator system.
An elevator is operated in response to requests generated through operation of a hall call button placed at a landing entrance on each of the floors and a car call button (also called a destination button) located inside the elevator car, and the statuses of the hall call button on each of the floors and the car call button in the car are sequentially transmitted to an elevator control unit. Wire communication has been generally used for this type of transmission.
Use of a wireless system for information transmission between an elevator machine room and a car is proposed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 6-227766, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 7-97152 and Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 11-150505. Further, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 3-46979 discloses a system in which a control panel in an elevator machine room on a rooftop of a building and an indicator at a landing entrance on each floor are connected by a wireless communication line.
On the other hand, in technical fields other than those related to an elevator system, there is a technology that involves the use of a plurality of specified small power wireless transmitting/receiving units or very-weak radio wave transmitting/receiving units, by which information is transmitted not directly, but by relaying the information between the units. Such technologies are disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 5-292577, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 6-348999, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 9-66129 and Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 9-205908.
The above-mentioned conventional technologies in the field of elevator system have not been widely used because it has been presumed that a wireless unit having a large output capacity needs to be used corresponding to the height of the building. Further, none of the known technologies is sufficient to reduce the number of elevator wires in the building serviced by the elevator system.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Elevator system having terminals with wireless transmitting/receiving unit


A device and process for aerating dispersions, particularly for flotation of pulp suspensions, in a de-inking process where the pulp suspension containing dirt particles is sprayed into a tank together with air. The air is injected at a minimum of two successive points and mixed with the suspension.

This invention relates generally to apparatus and processes for aerating dispersions. More particularly, the present invention relates to apparatus and processes for aerating pulp suspensions during de-inking.
De-inking flotation is a mechanical process for removing impurities and ink particles from pulp suspensions produced particularly in waste paper treatment. This process requires the generating of gas bubbles in the appropriate quantity and size distribution. Hydrophobic substances or substances to which ampholytics are added to make them hydrophobic, such as ink particles or stickies, are carried to the surface of the liquid by the gas bubbles adhering to them and can be removed from the surface as scum. This is referred to as selective flotation because the pulp is discharged with the accept due to its hydrophile nature. Processes of this type are known in numerous geometric modifications, for example from DE 41 16 916 C2 or EP 0 211 834 B1, and have reached a high technical standard. Further, it has also proved successful to use self-priming injectors to generate gas bubbles and mix these with the pulp suspension. These injectors basically comprise a propulsive jet nozzle, a mixing or impulse exchange pipe, and a diffuser. Here, the liquid flow emerging from the propulsive jet nozzle according to the open jet principle generates under pressure. As a result, gas is sucked in and mixed with the liquid as a result of the impulse exchange between liquid and gas in the mixing pipe. At the exit from the diffuser used for energy recovery a dispersion of pulp and bubbles is formed. Use of the known processes and injectors, however, has shown several disadvantages in selective flotation of pulp suspensions.
The suction effect of the known injectors in operation with pulp suspensions is too weak and the bubble size distribution generated by the injector known does not have the optimum design to meet the requirements of selective flotation.
The invention is, therefore, based on the task of designing an injector with greater suction effect and optimum bubble size distribution for use in de-inking flotation.
The process according to the invention is thus characterized by the gas, particularly air, being sucked in by the effect of the injector at a minimum of two successive points and mixed with the suspension. Due to suction taking place in stages, the pulp can be loosened by the gas in the first stage, thus achieving a better spread of the free jet in the second stage, resulting in improved suction effect and corresponding bubble generating, particularly with a reduction in the fine bubble portion to avoid solids losses.
An advantageous further development of the invention is characterized by some 20 to 95% of the entire quantity of gas, particularly air, sucked in being taken in the first stage. Since intake of the quantity of gas, particularly air, is divided over several suction points, more even mixing of the suspension with the gas is obtained. This allows a specific suitable bubble size to be set.
A favorable configuration of the invention is characterized by the gas and liquid flow obtained by suction and mixing being transferred in a free jet after the first stage. As a result, use of the kinetic energy of the jet, in particular, can be improved for renewed intake of gas.
A favorable further development of the invention is characterized by the gas or air loading of the pulp suspension directly after being sprayed in amounting to approximately 50-150%.
The invention also refers to a device for aerating dispersions, particularly a flotation device for de-inking pulp suspensions with an injector, characterized by at least two suction points being arranged in series in flow direction. Due to suction taking place in stages, the pulp can be loosened by the gas in the first stage, thus achieving a better spread of the free jet in the second stage, resulting in improved suction effect and corresponding bubble generating, particularly with a reduction in the fine bubble portion to avoid solids losses.
A favorable further development of the invention is characterized by the injection channel widening after the first suction point. Thus, the kinetic energy of the jet can be put to good use in a favorable manner.
An advantageous further development of the invention is characterized by a panel being mounted at the end of the injector channel across the flow direction. This panel acts as a radial diffuser to recover energy from the liquid jet.
An advantageous configuration of the invention is characterized by the panel being mounted on a slant to the flow direction.
A favorable further development of the invention is characterized by the panel containing internals for targeted guidance of the flow. As a result, the injector can also be mounted in any desired position in the flotation cell.
A favorable configuration of the invention is characterized by a minimum of two injectors being mounted in parallel in the form of an injector group. With this design it is also possible to handle large throughputs accordingly.