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This newletter is highlighting some of the applications where AIC's products are used. If you have an interesting application and would not mind sharing your experiences, please send us some details (and a photo or two if you can).
You can contact me by sending a note to mailist@aicpl.com.au
We are also taking the opportunity to highlight the announcement of an innovative wind speed/direction sensor that uses NO moving parts.
We would also like to encourage you to please take the time to complete our very short quality survey. The survey is designed to gather feedback about various aspects of AIC products and services. From the feedback we will seek to improve areas of our operations that you, our customers, feel could be improved.
We will respond to comments and may ask you to elaborate on areas where you feel we have room for improvement.
You can link to our survey here
Peter Rienits
Editor
In May 2003 Amalgamated Instrument Co Pty Ltd celebrated 25 years in business.
The company was founded in 1978 and very soon was undertaking contract manufacturing for Leeds and Northrup in Australia. The founder, Peter Eliot came from a background of technical service in the UK. As the requirements from Leeds and Northrup wound down, Amalgamated Instrument Co Pty Ltd (AIC) began looking for other areas where the expertise of the employees could be deployed.
Since then AIC has grown to become a well known supplier of very sophisticated, flexible instrumentation. Products are available for a huge range of applications.
AIC employs approximately 20 people (it varies from time to time). The employees cover all aspects of a design and manufacturing company from R&D to manufacture (AIC has its own surface mount capability for example) to marketing, sales and support.
One of the benefits of having all departments and activities so closely connected is the incredible flexibility that AIC can offer to their customers. From a very strong base of standard instruments, AIC can provide the solution to almost any application. The Research and Development department thrives on challenges and the microprocessor design of the instrumentation allows for customisation and modification to meet your requirements.
As well as instrumentation, AIC has built up a reputation as a supplier of a wide range of complementary transducers and sensors for a wide range of applications.
Research is ongoing to enhance and improve the range of instrumentation and sensors with new products being released all the time.
AIC has always sought to act quickly to requests for information and support and has developed a product information system and quotation system that is the envy of many other suppliers. Export markets are growing and the ability to use electronic means of getting brochures, manuals and quotes to overseas customers has been seen as critical to AIC's operations. All the tools have been developed "in house" which allows for tight control of the accuracy of information and quotes as well as flexibility in the timeliness of updates and announcements.
A new wind sensor available from AIC uses no moving parts.
The sensor consists of a slotted housing with a sophisticated CMOS "chip" mounted in the centre under a thin ceramic disc. The slotted housing straightens the air flow across the ceramic disc.
The chip has pairs of temperature sensors at right angles to each other. The whole device is heated to slightly (12ºK) above ambient temperature. The temperature of the incoming airflow is measured by one sensor and the airstream is heated slightly as it passes over the ceramic chip. The resulting temperature is measured by the opposite sensor in the pair. The faster the air stream the less it is heated as it passes over the chip surface. The differences in temperatures (and they are very small) between opposite sensors caused by the airflow are measured and a microprocessor, located in the stem of the unit, calculates a wind speed. The relationship between the calculated wind speed between the two pairs of sensors at right angles to each other is translated to a resultant wind direction.
The resulting wind speed and wind direction are then transmitted as serial data (either RS232 or RS422).
The wind speed accuracy is ±0.5 m/sec and the wind direction is accurate to ±3º. The sensor is ideal for many applications both fixed and mobile (such as seagoing vessels). With no moving parts, the sensor has very low maintenance and is uneffected by precipitation and pollution.
Wind speed/direction sensor brochure
Meteorological Sensors available from AIC
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Did you know that fish can die of "pH shock"?
Exotic fish are imported in plastic bags of water just like buying a goldfish locally. Biowaste (Ammonia) & CO2 produced by the fish during transportation lower the pH in the bag by the time it arrives at its destination. Oxygen is supplied to the bag to keep the fish alive longer. This also works to lower pH during transportation.
This gradual reduction of pH during transportation is not really a bad thing, as it reduces the toxicity of Ammonia in the water (the toxicity of Ammonia is directly related to pH), and Ammonia is the most common killer of fish during transportation.
The problem occurs when the fish arrive at their destination. If these fish are put straight into a holding or quarantine tank, the change in pH may be enough to kill them.
The common practice is to trickle the fresh holding tank water into the bag water to increase pH slowly.
The downside of this is that as the pH increases, so does the toxicity of the Ammonia in the combined water - and Ammonia poisoning can continue to affect the exposed fish for up to a week or more after it is removed to fresh holding tank water, and can result in unnecessary deaths.
Aqualife Australia, a Melbourne based importer of exotic fish, is using AIC's range of pH electrodes fitted with 4-20 mA transmitters and the AIC TP488-IV 8 channel scanning monitor to adjust the water in the holding tanks to the pH in the transport bags and then slowly adjust the holding tank water to the required pH. They claim this not only saves them costly fish losses, but also ongoing wages for staff to double-handle fish and wait for pH changes before fish are moved to holding tanks. The TP488 is fitted with onboard datalogging so a record can be made and kept of the water conditions.
Lifting of patients in hospitals and nursing homes must be done correctly.
Most establishments use a hoist type device to lift and transfer patients. These patient hoists must be tested and certified on an annual basis to comply with Australian Standards, and to ensure that their load capacity, safety and performances meet specifications.
In Tasmania, Industrial Technik's medical service division, Medi-Technik, have put together a test rig using AIC's HH4-WT handheld weight meter. An S-type load cell is attached to the hoist in place of the patient sling and the HH4-WT is used to measure the capacity of the lift.
The load cells used with the HH4-WT are fitted with memory chips to utilise the unique auto calibration feature in the HH4-WT. This ensures that the calibration data for this load cell, stored in the memory chip, is restored when returning to the load cell after the HH4-WT has been used with other load cells and calibrations.
One of the main tests required is a lift and descend with 125% of safe working load applied. The use of the HH4-WT meter, load cell and weights allows Medi-Technik to accurately make this test and supply compliant test certificates.
Medi-Technik undertook the certification of the system for Weights & Measures in Tasmania. The AIC equipment is not supplied with Weights & Measures certification as standard.
Usually a water purifying system is used to provide good clean water and the contaminants are thrown away.
An application developed by IntelEco Pty Ltd and using some of AIC's conductivity instrumentation and sensors is doing the opposite. The water is discarded and the contaminants are kept!
Australia is a signatory to several treaties covering activities in the Antarctic. One such treaty covers the disposal of waste from human activiy. In the past contaminated water had been shipped back to Australia for disposal. IntelEco, in conjunction with Melbourne University, developed the "ICEQUBE" low temperature distillation unit. This unit uses low temperature, vacuum assisted distallation to remove the contaminants from wastewater. The distallate (now pure water) is returned to the environment and the contaminants (now much concentrated) are returned to Australia. This means a huge saving in space and weight in transport and huge savings in transport costs.
The "ICEQUBE" has the capacity to process 5000 litres of contaminated water per day. The inlet water can be 3 times as conductive as seawater and the output is pure.
IntelEco has used two of AIC's DIN rail mount RM4-CO conductivity monitors with AIC's Australian made conductivity cells in "ICEQUBE" to monitor the incoming and final conductivity of the water. Alarms are configured to operate in case of problems (each RM4-CO has two configurable relays as standard).
IntelEco also manufactures a range of very efficient low temperature water purifying machines for domestic, laboratory and industrial use.
IntelEco has recently changed its name to H2AU Pty Ltd (pronounced H2O!)
RM4-CO brochure
Conductivity Cells
Visit H2AU's Website (http://www.h2au.com)
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