Thesis (B.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 1978. / MICROFICHE COPY AVAILABLE IN ARCHIVES AND ENGINEERING. / Includes bibliographical references. / by Robert L. Maresca. / B.S.

A automatização de processos e o emprego de técnicas de telesupervisão e telecomando, tem sido nas últimas décadas uma das principais preocupações de técnicos e administradores para oferecer às comunidades, um padrão elevado de serviços, numa contínuo aumento de confiabilidade, atendendo assim às exigências do homem moderno. O presente trabalho aborda o problema do controle do abastecimento de água tratada a uma região de 3.200 km², onde vivem mais de 12 milhões de habitantes. A experiência de transformar um sistema primário de controle num sistema automático e telemétrico, para atender uma região desse porte, foi realmente uma experiência inédita, dadas as características peculiares do sistema hidráulico existente. Por ter sido uma atividade multidisciplinar, congregando as áreas de hidráulica, instrumentação, telemetria, controle de processos, comunicações e informática, descreve-se o processo de abastecimento de água da Região Metropolitana de São Paulo, a caracterização do sistema de controle operacional, os meios de comunicação homem-máquina envolvendo os equipamentos de telemetria, a organização do \"software\" dos computadores usados na supervisão e controle, os aspectos principais que nortearam todo o desenvolvimento, os problemas encontrados e as soluções adotadas. Espera-se que este trabalho, através de suas conclusões, possa contribuir para a solução de problemas semelhantes, não somente no campo da hidráulica mas em outras aplicações, onde o processo seja distribuído fisicamente sobre uma região extensa, e que envolva velocidade de ação e reação lentas, se comparadas por exemplo com as comuns no campo da energia elétrica. / Process automation and the use of telesupervision and telecommand techniques have been, during the last decades, one of the main subjects of interest of managers and technicians to offer a high standard of services with an ever growing reliability, as required by communities today. This text approaches the problem of control of the treated water supply to a 3.200 km² region, in which live more than 12 million people. Transforming a quite unsophisticated control system into an automatic and telemetric one in so large an area was an absolutely novel experience in Brazil, considering the particular characteristic of the existing hydraulic system. Since it was a multidisciplinary activity, involving hydraulic instrumentation, telemetry, process control, communications and informatics, this text describes the treated water supply system in the São Paulo Metropolitan Region, the operational control system, man-machine communications involving telemetry equipment, the computer software organization applied to control and supervisic the main development guidelines, the problems that were faced and the solutions found. It is hoped that this text and its conclusions may help solve similar problems, not only in the field of hydraulics, but also in other applications where the process is physically distributed over a large area and involves low action and reaction velocities as compared, for instance, with the ones in the field of electricity.

A automatização de processos e o emprego de técnicas de telesupervisão e telecomando, tem sido nas últimas décadas uma das principais preocupações de técnicos e administradores para oferecer às comunidades, um padrão elevado de serviços, numa contínuo aumento de confiabilidade, atendendo assim às exigências do homem moderno. O presente trabalho aborda o problema do controle do abastecimento de água tratada a uma região de 3.200 km², onde vivem mais de 12 milhões de habitantes. A experiência de transformar um sistema primário de controle num sistema automático e telemétrico, para atender uma região desse porte, foi realmente uma experiência inédita, dadas as características peculiares do sistema hidráulico existente. Por ter sido uma atividade multidisciplinar, congregando as áreas de hidráulica, instrumentação, telemetria, controle de processos, comunicações e informática, descreve-se o processo de abastecimento de água da Região Metropolitana de São Paulo, a caracterização do sistema de controle operacional, os meios de comunicação homem-máquina envolvendo os equipamentos de telemetria, a organização do \"software\" dos computadores usados na supervisão e controle, os aspectos principais que nortearam todo o desenvolvimento, os problemas encontrados e as soluções adotadas. Espera-se que este trabalho, através de suas conclusões, possa contribuir para a solução de problemas semelhantes, não somente no campo da hidráulica mas em outras aplicações, onde o processo seja distribuído fisicamente sobre uma região extensa, e que envolva velocidade de ação e reação lentas, se comparadas por exemplo com as comuns no campo da energia elétrica. / Process automation and the use of telesupervision and telecommand techniques have been, during the last decades, one of the main subjects of interest of managers and technicians to offer a high standard of services with an ever growing reliability, as required by communities today. This text approaches the problem of control of the treated water supply to a 3.200 km² region, in which live more than 12 million people. Transforming a quite unsophisticated control system into an automatic and telemetric one in so large an area was an absolutely novel experience in Brazil, considering the particular characteristic of the existing hydraulic system. Since it was a multidisciplinary activity, involving hydraulic instrumentation, telemetry, process control, communications and informatics, this text describes the treated water supply system in the São Paulo Metropolitan Region, the operational control system, man-machine communications involving telemetry equipment, the computer software organization applied to control and supervisic the main development guidelines, the problems that were faced and the solutions found. It is hoped that this text and its conclusions may help solve similar problems, not only in the field of hydraulics, but also in other applications where the process is physically distributed over a large area and involves low action and reaction velocities as compared, for instance, with the ones in the field of electricity.

<p>This report is the result of a master thesis at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Division of Industrial and Economical Development, at Linköping University of Technology. The project was carried out on behalf of Fanerami AB, Mjölby and includes 20 weeks of full time schedule work.</p><p>Cabinets with vertical mounted roller shutters all share the same problem, namely weight balancing. A roller shutter has an equilibrium area where the sum of the different forces acting on the shutter equals zero. As the shutter leaves that area it will pick up speed as it falls towards the bottom. When the shutter hits the bottom of the cabinet there is a potential risk of getting fingers caught and in this project a solution to prevent this from happening was to be presented.</p><p>In this project, three concepts have been generated with the following different purposes:</p><p>•In concept 1 the risk of getting any fingers caught when the shutter closes was to be eliminated in an efficient and inexpensive way.</p><p>•In concept 2 the roller shutter had to be balanced at all time providing the possibility to keep the cabinet open in any position.</p><p>•The last and most challenging task was to create a remote controlled TV cabinet. The shutters were mounted horizontally and were to be opened simply by pushing the bottom either on the remote transmitter unit or the cabinet.</p><p>The first concept uses a small oil damper, often seen in kitchen cabinets and drawers. The roller shutter applies pressure on the damper via a lever that transforms the shutter motion along a certain path to a smaller motion in the direction of the damper. By doing so, a smaller damper with higher pressure can be used. Dampers are available with several different pressures and can be mounted in five different positions; therefore the concept can be adjusted to fit almost any cabinet.</p><p>Concept 2 consists of a thin cord winded around a wheel. The wheel is equipped with a spring that tightens when the cord is pulled in. The spring produces an equal and opposite force that holds the shutter in balance. As the wheel is mounted in the upper front of the cabinet, underneath the shutter, it will almost be invisible. The concept is easy to adjust to most cabinets by simply attach the shutter at different levels. In that way the spring will be tightened to equal the weight of the shutter.</p><p>The design of the TV cabinet has been a working progress throughout the whole project. A couple of prototypes were produced before the final concept. The mechanical solution is based on two pinion rackets placed one on each side of a rotating pinion powered by a motor through a planetary gearbox. To control the cabinet Electronic Solutions AB developed an electronic system that made it possible to open and close the shutters with a remote control or a switch on the cabinet.</p>

The transition to digital TV is changing the television set into an entertainment as well as information supplier device that provides two-way communication with the viewer. However, the present remote control device is not appropriate for navigation through the huge amount of services and information provided by the future digital TV, presumably also a device for accessing the Internet. One possibility for coping with the complex information navigation required by TV viewers is an augmentation of the interaction tools currently available for TV. Two approaches to such an augmentation are investigated in this thesis: linking paper-based TV guides to the digital TV and enhancing the remote control unit with speech interaction. Augmentation of paper-based TV guides is a futuristic research approach based on the integration of paper-based TV guides into computation technology. This solution provides interactive paper-based TV guides that also function as a remote control for the TV. A prototype system is developed and explorative studies are conducted to investigate this approach. These studies indicate the benefits of integrating paper-based TV guides into the TV set. They also illuminate the potential to provide innovative solutions for home information systems. Integrating familiar physical artefacts, such as paper and pen into TV technology may provide easy access to information services usually provided by PCs and the Internet. Thus, the same augmentation needed for TV as an entertainment device also opens up new communication channels for providing society information to citizens who do not feel comfortable with conventional computers. The thesis also reports on studies of speech interfaces for TV information navigation. Traditional speech interfaces have several common problems, such as user acceptance and misinterpretation of user input. These problems are investigated in empirical and explorative studies with implementation of mockups and running research systems. We have found that the pragmatic solution of augmenting remote control devices by speech is a suitable solution that eases information navigation and search. / On the day of the public defence the status of articles III and V was: Submitted.

This thesis proposes a design strategy for pleasant touch. Literature is reviewed on the importance of pleasant touch, existing implementations in products and design for tactility. A lack of competence is found on how to design for pleasant touch in the interface of products: functional pleasant tactility. Therefore, a design vision is created by the author as a designer, on how to design functional pleasant tactility. The envisioned design strategy is then implemented through a study where a Bang &amp / Olufsen TV remote control was used as an example case. The study includes three sequential phases: exploring, designing, and evaluating functional pleasant tactility in the given context. Exploring was done through workshops where design students were asked to touch objects with various material properties. Pleasant movements were performed with the objects, and matching functions were imagined, resulting in &lsquo / actions&rsquo / . Those actions were analyzed to discover three underlying themes of inviting, mastery and logic. In the designing phase, those themes were translated into three corresponding design concepts, and worked out into prototypes. In the evaluating phase, those prototypes were tested with that target group, and the results were used to create a final design concept. The study then concludes with a design strategy that is expected to work for the broader context of industrial design, and recommendations for further research with this strategy and different products or companies are also provided.

Water infrastructure on Aboriginal communities in Canada, and specifically Northern Manitoba is in sub-standard condition. A recent Government of Canada study indicated that an estimated $1.5 billion would need to be spent to improve this infrastructure. September 2003 through July 2004, an examination of the effectiveness of a membrane bioreactor (MBR) in a Northern Manitoban Aboriginal community took place. This study was intended to identify and test an appropriate and effective solution for the lack of adequate wastewater treatment in these communities. The MBR system, employing a Zenon ZW-10 ultrafiltration membrane, was designed and constructed at the University of Manitoba. It was installed and tested in two phases at the Opaskwayak Cree Nation Reserve in Northern Manitoba. Phase I was a direct comparison between the pilot-scale MBR and the community’s existing Sequencing Batch Reactor (SBR) with sand filter. This phase occurred from September 2003 until December 2003. The MBR, with an SRT of 20-days and an HRT of 10 hours, outperformed the SBR in every category despite 2 mechanical/electrical failures that resulted in the loss of biomass from the MBR. The SBR/Sand filter combination had BOD, TSS, and TKN concentrations of 30.3 mg/L, 27.5 mg/L, and 8.4 mg/L, respectively. By comparison, the BOD, TSS, and TKN concentrations in the MBR effluent were <6 mg/L, <5 mg/L, and 1.3 mg/L respectively. Phase II, from March 2004 through July 2004, tested the overall MBR efficacy and intended to assess a novel remote control and monitoring system. The MBR SRT was adjusted to 40-days and, as expected, the MBR MLVSS concentration increased to a relatively stable 5000 mg/L. The MBR continued to provide high quality effluent with some exceptions. Despite the 0.034 μm pore size, the total coliforms and TSS measured in the effluent were higher than in Phase I. This indicates a compromised membrane, faulty sampling procedures, or biological regrowth downstream of the membrane. This failure could point to the need for some form of tertiary disinfection. Also in Phase II, a remote control and monitoring program was implemented. The controlling PC was controlled via the internet using pcAnywhere software. The software allowed for real-time monitoring and complete control of the pilot system. In conclusion, the pilot-scale MBR yielded consistent, high quality wastewater effluent and this would benefit the pristine environments existing in Manitoba’s north. The potential hands-free operation could be utilized to provide support to communities lacking sufficient wastewater treatment know-how. / February 2006

During last decades, the Internet teleobotics has been growing at an enormous ratedue to the rapid improvement of Internet technology. This paper presents theinternet-based remote control of mobile robot. To face unpredictable Internet delaysand possible connection rupture, a direct continuous control based teleoperationarchitecture with “Speed Limit Module” (SLM) and “Delay Approximator” (DA) isproposed. This direct continuous control architecture guarantees the path error of therobot motion is restricted within the path error tolerance of the application.Experiment results show the feasibility and effectiveness of this direct Internet controlarchitecture in the real Internet environment.

In conventional bilateral teleoperation, transmission delay over the Internet can potentially cause instability. The wave variable algorithm guarantees stability under varying transmission delay at the cost of poor transient performance. Adding a predictor on the master side can reduce this undesirable side-effect, but that would require a slave model. An inaccurate slave model used in the predictor as well as variations in transmission delay, both of which are likely under realistic situations, can result in steady state errors. A direct drift control algorithm is used to drive this error to zero regardless of the source of error. A semi-adaptive predictor that can distinguish between free space and rigid contact environment is used to provide more accurate force feedback on the master side. A full adaptive predictor is also used that estimates the slave environment parameters using recursive least squares with a forgetting factor. This research presents the experimental results and evaluations of the wave variable based methods under a realistic operation environment using a real master and slave. The effectiveness of this algorithm is fully evaluated using human subjects with no previous experience in haptics. Three algorithms are tested using PHANTOM brand haptic devices as master and slave: conventional bilateral teleoperation with no transmission delay as control, wave variable teleoperation with approximately 200 ms transmission delay one way, and wave variables with adaptive predictor and direct drift control with approximately 200 ms transmission delay one way. For each algorithm the human subjects are asked to perform three simple tasks: use the master to force the slave to track a reference trajectory in free space with the least amount of error, identify a contour surface on the slave side as accurately as possible using only haptic information from the master, and navigate a simple maze on the slave side in the least amount of time using haptic information from the master.

In the past decade, the technologies of computer communication and PC hardware/software evolve in a very fast pace. Many conventional industries are refurbished with these new tools. Hence the operation of the industry can be improved, and even the products, equipped with new technology, demonstrate a new dimension of their function. Among all these new ideas or tools, we would like to study the feasibility of integrating WWW server, Java JNI, Real-time Linux and PC-based hardware components together to form an internet-based manufactory service server. In this work, we use Linux Redhat OS as the platform, and its Apache homepage server to provide users to access the services, such as activating a relay or retrieving the status of a limit switch. Enhanced with Java JNI, the WWW server can access the control of PC's hardware. More importantly, patching the OS with real-time packages, the WWW server is transformed into real-time controller which is much cheaper and much reliable than its opponents, such as Microsoft NT. RS 232 serial ports, an 8255 multi-function I/O card, optical encoder card, D/A card and a servo motor are integrated under the command of the WWW server. By browsing the control center's homepage, users can easily acquire the status of the peripherals, or send out control command remotely. Experiment results confirm the performance of the system. The structure of this experimental server can be modified to fit the requirement of a remotely operated or tele-monitoring system by rewriting the homepage.