Electronics News February 2011

n ew s Australia’s Premier Electronics Magazine

w w w. e l e c t r o n i c s n e w s . c o m . a u INSIDE

FEBRUARY 11

Thermal management Faster chips, smaller devices. How are engineers keeping cool?

Page 14

News 4

Spintronics for silicon University of Sydney researchers find new compatibility between technologies.

Technology 10

Flexible LEDs Overcoming mechanical and geometrical design constraints with next-gen optoelectronics.

Feature 17

The broadband question The politics get the headlines, but what technologies and issues are behind the NBN debate?

Design Corner 20

Wireless sensors, sans batteries

Post Print Approved PP255003/00319

How energy harvesting can replace batteries in wireless sensors.

Feature 23

New challenges for PCB design

Design | Communications | Environmental | Industrial | Research | Medical | Consumer

We look at the latest problems facing PCB designers, and how two companies are helping.

NEWS

n ew s

EDITOR’S MESSAGE

Industry moves out of the trough

Published five times a year Reed Business Information Pty Ltd Tower 2, 475 Victoria Avenue Chatswood NSW 2067 Tel: (02) 9422 2999 Fax: (02) 9422 2977 www.electronicsnews.com.au EDITOR Kevin Gomez Tel: (02) 9422 2976 kevin.gomez@reedbusiness.com.au EDITORIAL COORDINATOR Isaac Leung Tel: (02) 9422 2956 isaac.leung@reedbusiness.com.au

Kevin Gomez Editor

KEY ACCOUNT MANAGER Sarah Bateman Tel: (02) 9422 8994 Fax: (02) 9422 2722 sarah.bateman@reedbusiness.com.au QLD SALES MANAGER Sharon R. Amos PO Box 3136, Bracken Ridge QLD 4017 Tel: (07) 3261 8857 Fax: (07) 3261 8347 sharon.amos@reedbusiness.com.au BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER Alex Evans Tel: (02) 9422 2890 Fax: (02) 9422 2722 alex.evans@reedbusiness.com.au PRODUCTION COORDINATOR Jennifer Collinson Tel: (02) 9422 2657 jennifer.collinson@reedbusiness.com.au GRAPHIC DESIGNER Ronnie Lawrence ronald.lawrence@reedbusiness.com.au SUBSCRIPTIONS Customer Service Tel: 1300 360 126.

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• Contract Manufacturing • Designing Interconnections • Medical Applications

FROM a challenging year that’s just past, we sit on the threshold of considerable growth in the electronics industry. Most analysts believe the industry is closer to the peak than the trough.

This optimism is borne out by the impending glut in foundry capacity as GlobalFoundries, TSMC, UMC and Samsung invest heavily in boosting capacity. With DRAM prices expected to fall through 2011, we will see designs built around newer DDR3 modules and with 4GB as the predominant memory configuration.

As we go to press, the Federal Government signs off on $1.6 million worth of National Broadband Network equipment contracts with three companies. Aside from creating 400 jobs, this will offer significant engineering, design and implementation opportunities for the local electronics industry.

In this issue, we examine the technologies and options behind the design and implementation of this mammoth task and draw on the experience of the US which faced similar, but perhaps, less daunting challenges.

In the electronics industry, gadgets, gizmos and semiconductors tend to steal the headlines. Electronics News turns the spotlight on the humble PCB and uncovers a sophisticated and complex world. Interesting work in PCB-FPGA codesign is being done right here in Australia. We pit rapid prototyping against software analysis to verify PCB design.

Our editorial team looks at one of the industry’s “hot” topics in this month’s

cover feature. Thermal management risks becoming one of the major roadblocks in the industry’s growth as engineers scramble to cool devices that pack more into smaller areas. Engineers are looking beyond the humble heat sink and exploring novel technologies such as heat pipes, exotic liquid cooling systems and thermofluidic heat spreaders.

Electronics News is also pleased to continue its association with Hooper Memorial Student Project conducted by La Trobe University. For the past 18 years, the program has been nurturing and recognising design skills among its students. Many of the winning projects were far from simple; an example is the high-speed, high-resolution, real-time FPGA-based telemetry system which collects and monitors operational information in an electric vehicle.

Following requests from readers, Electronics News is introducing a regular Design Corner starting with this issue. We will work closely with industry to bring our readers novel applications and circuit designs that are relevant to Australia.

Do check out our website (www.electronicsnews.com.au) as we have several interesting developments in the pipeline.

As always, we welcome feedback and comment. Feel free to drop me an email or hop online and join the discussion.

The team at Electronics News wishes our readers and advertisers a successful and profitable year ahead.

kevin.gomez@reedbusiness.com.au

www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 3

NEWS

IN BRIEF

PV MODULE OVERSUPPLY IMS Research claims PV module production capacity increased by nearly 70% over the course of 2010, reaching nearly 30GW by the end of the year.

This increase is forecast to continue, even as the PV installation growth rate slows from over 100% in 2010 to less than 20% in 2011.

In 2010, there was a record demand for PV modules due to attractive returns from incentive schemes run by governments. This was especially visible in European countries like Germany, italy and the Czech Republic.

These schemes are now reducing the rates offered for electricity generated from PV systems, slowing the increase in global solar power system installations.

Despite this situation, many suppliers are proceeding with aggressive capacity expansions, which may lead to an oversupply of modules in 2011, leading to tougher competition and decreasing prices.

IMS Research claims leading suppliers can remain optimistic, at the expense of smaller, Tier-2 suppliers.

BLUGLASS COMMISSIONS RAINBOW FOUNDRY FOR INGAN SOLAR CELL PROTOTYPES BLUGLASS has commissioned Rainbow Optoelectronics Materials Shanghai’s foundry service to fabricate and process devices to create a nitride solar cell prototype.

The nitride solar cell prototype was designed by BluGlass.

By commissioning the foundry services of Rainbow, the Australian company says it will not need to invest in additional capital equipment during this research and development phase.

Rainbow is a semiconductor device manufacturing company which provides nitride semiconductors to companies in various countries.

In 2009, BluGlass commenced research into Indium Gallium Nitride (InGaN) solar cells, establishing a subsidiary called BluSolar. If successful, InGaN solar cells are expected to be long lasting, relatively inexpensive, and the most efficient solar cells yet created.

4 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

RESEARCH

Spintronics-based storage DR Dane McCamey from the University of Sydney and his international colleagues have demonstrated that the spin of atomic nuclei in silicon can store information for over one hundred seconds.

The information can then be read out electrically, providing a critical step in linking spintronics with classical electronics.

It takes less energy to flip a spin over than to move an electron around, reducing the resultant heat and energy use.

The newly found compatibility with silicon allows spintronic technology to be incorporated into existing uses, allowing the integration of spin-based information storage and processing devices onto a single chip.

McCamey’s paper was published

by Science on 17 December 2010 under the title “Electronic Spin Storage in an Electrically Readable Nuclear Spin Memory with a Lifetime >100 Seconds”.

The experiments were made possible by using unique equipment

Spintronics is expected to overcome some of the challenges faced by traditional electronics. for controlling electronic and nuclear spins in high magnetic fields and at very low temperatures at the

National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (NHMFL) in Tallahassee, Florida. ■

INDUSTRIAL

electronica 2010 shows upward trend THE ORGANISERS of electronica 2010 claim the event attendance has confirmed the global upward trend in the electronics industry.

The event ran from 9 to 12 November 2010, and saw over 70,000 trade visitors.

2595 international exhibitors presented their products, solutions and services at the trade fair.

59% of exhibitors and 47% of visitors came from abroad to electronica 2010 in Munich.

Exhibitors hailed from 45 countries, and organisers say the mood at the trade fair was characterised by the upturn in the industry during the last few months.

Attendees and exhibitors agreed that companies can expect stable growth in future and are banking on innovative future technologies.

The event was also host to the electronica automotive conference,

which saw 323 delegates from 23 countries attending the conference on 8 and 9 November 2010.

A total of 1,281 exhibitors presented their products and services in the automotive exhibition segment, with 559 of these relating to electromobility.

Key topics were vehicle safety, energy efficiency and sustainability.

The exhibition segment had a large number of components and systems for electric vehicles, and also a focus on energy-saving components and systems in regard to vehicle lights and vehicle control. electronica 2010 saw an increasing trend in photovoltaics and renewable energies. A total of 518 exhibitors presented electronic products for the management and monitoring of photovoltaic systems.

Exhibitors also showed storage technologies for wind and solar

The attendee numbers indicate an upward trend. power plants, components for power electronics, inverters and energy harvesting solutions for building services and industrial applications.

Electronic applications in medical technology were also very well-represented with 1,156 exhibitors in the sector. Products presented included electronic components for the latest generation of intelligent prostheses, portable medical devices, implantable blood pressure sensors and remote monitoring and control systems for heart pacemakers. ■

NEWS

INDUSTRIAL

Expanded electronics service and repairs workshop BALDOR Australia has expanded its electronics service and repairs workshop, more than doubling the size of the facility to 95 square metres.

The new workshop provides additional bench and storage space as well as work stations to enhance the level of services provided by Baldor. It is equipped with 100 Amps of power supply for testing purposes.

According to Baldor Australia, the facility will provide comprehensive support for its products, allowing customers to confidently choose its brand.

It also provides repairs for older products, ensuring legacy support.

The firm can provide repairs and refurbishment

for the entire range of Baldor and KB Electronics products. These include AC and DC inverter drives, soft starters, AC and DC servo drives, Baldor motion controllers and Delta Tau motion controllers. The facility can repair circuit boards down to component level.

The company can service and repair products that have been in operation for as long as 20 years, well beyond their obsolescence. The technicians and engineers are trained to use the latest technology to test and repair electronic equipment.

The workshop holds an inventory of components and spare parts, facilitating average repair turn around times of 3 working days. Urgent

The new workshop enhances the services provided by Baldor. repairs can be performed on the same day pending availability of parts. â– Baldor Australia dvera@baldor.com www.baldor.com.au

New equipment for opto-magneto research THE UNIVERSITY of Western Australia has obtained a 2011 Commonwealth Government grant to purchase and install specialised opto-magneto-electronics equipment for research.

Panorama Synergy says is a collaborating partner with UWA and will contribute to the order and also hopes to make significant use of the equipment to research a breakthrough in photonics.

According to the company, the new technology being researched, based on proprietary solid-state, light switching technology or magneto-photonic crystal, will hold significant performance and commercial advantages over the current digital light processing chip used in consumer devices.

The magneto-photonic crystal technology is expected to yield ultra high speed combined with low power consumption and heat output. This will enhance the performance of display technologies while reducing costs for the distribution and display of 2D and 3D content. â– Panorama Synergy www.panoramasynergy.com 6 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

NEWS

INDUSTRIAL

IN BRIEF

Engineering an accurate low flow water meter IN NOVEMBER 2010, Aquiba unveiled the A200 water meter.

A key feature of the product is its ability to measure water flow extremely accurately, even at very low flow rates below one litre per hour, such as that of a dripping tap.

Electronics News spoke to Sentec’s CEO Mark England and commercial director Tom Fryers regarding the technology and its development.

Aquiba is a joint venture between metering technology specialist Sentec and Takahata, an engineering company based in Japan. The A200 utilises a combination of Sentec’s smart technology and Takahata’s manufacturing know-how.

The companies worked closely together on the specification of the A200 meter. Sentec developed the electronics and firmware to meet the specification, while Takahata concentrated on the mechanical design, manufacturing and calibration.

A challenge to the team was the very large dynamic range of the water meter, up to 5000:1.

Accuracy was a key concern. Over a large part of the flow range, accuracy was ±2% of the flow rate, and at the lowest flow rates, it was ±5%.

However, even this percentage of accuracy required a recovered signal dynamic range of 100,000:1.

To ensure stable performance and accuracy, the design team had to choose the right architecture for the analogue to digital converter.

Factors included the resolution and linearity required, and the fact that the whole meter was run on a few hundred microwatts. This ruled out the use of SAR architectures.

“We paid a great deal of attention to the design and selection of components to ensure that the performance is stable over temperature and battery voltage, and the effects of low frequency 1/f noise are minimised,” said England.

Cost was also a factor. Silicon constitutes a large faction of overall cost in static electronic meters.

“The development team needed

K2 ENERGY CONTINUES DEVELOPMENT OF MST SOLAR CELL TECHNOLOGY K2 ENERGY says it has made significant progress on its MST solar cell program.

The company’s solar cells have been fabricated for testing at a USbased facility and at Tei Solutions, Japan. Both sets of cells were completed and tested in January.

The technology behind these solar cells, called MST technology, involves the production of an altered or “nanodoped” layer of silicon that can be used in the manufacturing of silicon solar PV cells.

This process has been proven in semiconductor manufacturing.

According to K2 Energy, the nanoduped layer increases the efficiency parameter for photovoltaic (PV) technology and solar power generation in silicon PV cells. This reduces the amount of silicon required, resulting in cheaper and more efficient PV cells.

K2 Energy acquired the exclusive rights to the solar application of MST intellectual property from Mears Technology. It is now testing and developing it for use in large-scale solar panel manufacturing.

R&D FUNDING FOR NZ WHEELCHAIR ELECTRONICS COMPANY

A number of considerations had to be made during the design of the unit. to make careful choices, based on confidential discussions with vendors to get not only low initial cost, but to take advantage of new product ranges,” explained England.

The A200 includes a secure optical port for direct communications on site, and a ZigBee radio.

The joint venture team says major improvements are still in the works for smart water meters, including 32bit processors with lower mA/MIP ratings, larger flash memory sizes, and lower power sleep modes.

“We want to make specific improvements, including low-power

low-speed high-resolution ADC converters with improved power consumption or input noise and micropower amplifiers with lower 1/f noise knees,” England told Electronics News.

According to Aquiba, smart electronic water meters like the A200 will be key to tackling Australia’s water problems, providing suppliers and consumers with the information and visibility to manage both supply and demand of the resource. ■ Aquiba info@aquiba.com www.aquiba.com

DYNAMIC Controls has been awarded NZ Government funding of up to NZ$5.28 million over three years for research and development.

Dynamic Controls manufactures electronic controls for wheelchairs and scooters.

The New Zealand company says the Technology Development Grant administered by the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology will allow it to accelerate its research and development and gain better results from the process.

Dynamic Controls says the funding will make New Zealand a more attractive centre of excellence for R&D within its global Invacare Group, and will also boost the Christchurch economy through the addition of more staff.

Dynamic Controls employs 360 staff with 190 based in Christchurch.

In 2009 it had revenues of approximately NZ$100 million.

www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 7

NEWS

RESEARCH

WINNERS

Engineering excellence

WINNING GRIN: Student winners, professors and sponsors pose with the awards at the 18th Annual Hooper Memorial Student Project Presentations. (Courtesy: LaTrobe Department of Electronic Engineering)

LA Trobe University’s Department of Electronic Engineering awarded prizes to seven final year and masters students during the 18th Annual Hooper Memorial Student Project Presentations.

The November 2010 ceremony enabled students to showcase their electronic engineering design work and projects which were developed over the year.

According to Professor John Devlin, head of the Department of Electronic Engineering at La Trobe University, the project work is a showcase of what La Trobe engineering students can achieve.

“Our course emphasises practical work with projects in each year; displayed here is the culmination of the skills and knowledge they have gained during the course,” he said.

The Annual Hooper Memorial Student Project awards are held in honour of the late Daryl Egbert Hooper, who established the department in 1975 and wrote many seminal publications in the field of transistor circuit design.

University officials say the cere8 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

mony was well attended by industry representatives, members of the university, and the wider community, including secondary schools.

Projects on display were from the engineering specialisation streams on offer in the department, including biomedical; communication; electronic systems; optical; and sustainable power engineering. These were accompanied by a short oral presentation by each student.

The students also manned a booth each where they displayed a poster and provided a demonstration of their work. Interested attendees were able to peer under the hood of the projects, interact, ask questions and gain an appreciation of the outstanding engineering design behind the project.

“These exchanges not only provide wonderful feedback to the students on the quality of their work, but in the past have led to job offers and commercial opportunities,” Professor Devlin told Electronics News. ■ www.latrobe.edu.au/ee/

Weller Tools Prize for PCB Engineering & Construction, sponsored by Apex Tool Group (Australia) Daniel Juniper – “Acquisition Device for Historical and Real-Time Analysis”: an industry based project used to capture and store data. It can act as a blackbox for vehicles.

Hooper Memorial Prize for the Best Oral Presentation, sponsored by EMCSI Peter Stavrou – “Universal Inertial Measurement Unit”: the unit utilises many sensors to provide vital data to the end user.

Hooper Memorial Prize fo or the Best Poster, sponsored by Future Fibre Technologies Merna Moushi – “Enhanced Neural Stimulator”: a low-power biomedical application project which stimulates varying neuron impedances.

IEEE Prize for Technical Innovation and Engineering Achievement, sponsored by IEEE Victorian Section Ben Giacoppo – “Self-Balancing Two Wheel Robot (Segway Mini)”: a two-wheel self balancing robot which is controlled wirelessly. Capable of left/right turns and moving back and forth at an average speed of 1.4m/s.

Soanar Plus Prize for best use off embedded microcontroller, sponsored by Soanar Plus Steven Pratt – “Rubik’s Cube Solving Robot”: a robot which melds electronic and mechanical engineering, Solves a Rubik’s cube using computer vision and motor control through an applied algorithm.

RS Components prize for Quality Project Mana agement, sponsored by RS Components Iraj Fathirad – “Electric Vehicle Telemetry and Monitoring”: a high speed/resolution, real-time FPGAbased telemetry system which collects and monitors operational information in an electric vehicle.

Electronic Engineering Prize for Best Masters Project, sponso ored by Department of Electronic Engineering Miroslav Radev – “Field Strength Meter with GPS”: a customdesigned RF field strength meter with touch screen and GPS, provides easy mobile signal strength analysis.

NEWS

ENVIRONMENTAL

Grant for a solar future

The $5.65m grant will be used for three major solar research projects.

CSIRO has been awarded a $5.65m grant from the Australian Solar Institute toward three major solar research projects.

The funding from the Australian Solar Institute will be used to develop a large scale solar air turbine, a thermoelectric generator and investigate the effects of solar intermittency on electricity grids.

According to the CSIRO’s Energy Transformed Flagship director, Dr Alex Wonhas, the funding will ensure the organisation’s solar thermal research remains at world-class level.

CSIRO is aiming for the ultimate goal of creating solar energy at a cost of 10 to 14 cents per kilowatt hour, and all the projects, despite their differing nature, are said to contribute to this endpoint.

If the CSIRO achieves this goal, solar energy will become a more efficient and cost-effective energy compared to fossil fuel sources.

The organisation is working with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Thermax and the Australian Energy Market Operator, as well as a number of major universities.

Solar air turbine power plants, one of the projects being funded, is believed to have potential as a power supply for remote communities and industries, as they do not require water to run.

The money will also go toward the development of a thermoelectric generator which is expected to reduce the cost of solar energy by 10% or more. The technology will convert heat from the sun into an immediate electricity supply for solar power plants to run their dayto-day operations.

These projects have been supported by the Australian Government through the Australian Solar Institute (ASI), part of the Clean Energy Initiative. ■

Milestone for dye solar cell project In December 2010, CSIRO and Dyesol held the first stage milestone meeting on the development of higher performing dyes for dye solar cells.

The two-year project is funded by an investment of up to $1.17 million from CSIRO’s Australian Growth Partnership.

According to Dyesol, the project leverages its knowledge and experience in developing dye solar cells, particularly ruthenium based dyes.

CSIRO brought its extensive modelling and research capabilities to

the table.

The initial stage of the program included the establishment of a research-scale assembly and testing facility manufactured by Dyesol and installed at CSIRO in Newcastle, which will be used to further the dye development project.

Ruthenium based dyes, or organometallic dyes, are one of the key enabling components in DSC technology, ensuring high power conversion efficiencies.■ www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 9

TECHNOLOGY

RESEARCH

Flexible and stretchable LEDs Making electronics flexible can boost the toughness and versatility of technology ESEARCHER John Rogers, professor of materials science and engineering with the University of Illinois, has developed flexible LEDs. While inorganic light-emitting diodes and photodetectors currently see use in many areas, they are still limited by mechanical and geometrical design constraints dictated by the rigidity of the semiconductor material. Flexible LEDs could see a variety of new applications.

The research was published in a paper titled “Waterproof AlInGaP optoelectronics on stretchable substrates with applications in biomedicine and robotics”, which appeared on 17 October 2010 in Nature Materials journal.

Rogers described systems that consist of arrays of interconnected, ultrathin inorganic light-emitting diodes and photodetectors configured in mechanically optimised layouts on unusual substrates.

These systems can accommodate extreme modes of mechanical deformation, for integration on a variety of materials and formats. They are operational even when completely immersed in saline solutions, biofluids and clinical liquids.

Such technologies could be used in a range of applications, including biomedicine applications like lightemitting sutures, implantable sheets and illuminated plasmonic crystals.

The flexible LEDs could also lead to waterproof optical-proximity-

R

The LED systems can accommodate extreme modes of mechanical deformation.

sensor tapes capable of conformal integration on curved surfaces of gloves and thin, refractive-index monitors wrapped on tubing for intravenous delivery systems.

To create the systems, the researchers fabricated them using a dual-transfer process. The first step involved the growing of the semiconductor materials onto a temporary substrate to form contacts,interconnections and structural bridges, and encapsulation layers. To release the fully-formed, interconnected devices, the team then dissolved the PMMA. A second transfer-printing step

The systems are operational even when completely immersed in solutions and liquids.

achieves integration on elastomeric sheets or other substrates coated with thin layers of PDMS, with strong bonding only at the locations of the devices.

The researchers used μ-ILEDs which have very small dimensions

and thicknesses, enabling the use of thin-film metallization for interconnect and optimised mechanical designs.

As demonstration units, the researchers built μ-ILED devices on swatches of fabric, tree leaves, sheets of paper, pieces of aluminium foil and balloon catheters.

In all cases, transfer printing successfully delivered the devices to these substrates with thin coatings of PDMS that served as planarising and strain-isolating layers. Bending and folding tests indicated robust operation under deformed states. ■

RESEARCH

Efficient GPU-based supercomputer CSIRO says its graphics processing unit cluster is now Australia’s greenest supercomputer, with a rank of 11 on the Green500 List.

The Green500 List is a list of the world’s 500 fastest and most energy efficient supercomputers.

The CSIRO claims by clustering

GPUs, it built a supercomputer which performed much more efficiently than traditional approaches. It can perform the Linpack benchmark at 52.55 Teraflops in double precision, with an energy efficiency of 555.5 MegaFlops/Watt.

The supercomputer is said to have

10 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

accelerated CSIRO’s scientific research, from 3D image reconstruction, analysing genetic data from wheat breeding experiments and modelling interactions between nutrients and plankton in the oceans.

Recently upgraded by Xenon Systems, it combines Intel CPUs with

64 NVIDIA Tesla S2050 GPUs. GPU-based supercomputers are twice as energy efficient as regular CPU supercomputers, completing calculations around 10 to 100x faster than CPUs. GPUs are also cheaper and occupy less rack space. ■ www.csiro.au

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TECHNOLOGY

INDUSTRIAL

Enhanced 3D microbatteries SIERRA WIRELESS AirPrime SL6087 & SL808x Offering the scalability, flexibility and reliability needed to take your connected devices into the future, the SL6087 embedded module features quad-band Edge in a 74-solderable pad LGA form factor. The SL808x embedded module delivers high-speed dual-band UMTS/HSDPA connectivity in the same standard LGA form factor.

Featuring: - Quad-band 850/900/1800/1900 MHz EDGE

The microbatteries are said to provide increased power in a small package.

RESEARCHERS from Rice University have built three-dimensional microbatteries with a core of nickel-tin nanowires.

The new batteries charge faster than lithium-ion batteries.

According to the researchers, the new microbatteries could power new generations of remote sensors, display screens, smart cards, flexible electronics and biomedical devices.

The batteries use vertical arrays of nickel-tin nanowires encased in PMMA. Pulickel Ajayan found a way to reliably coat single nanowires with a smooth layer of a PMMAbased gel electrolyte that insulates the wires from the counter electrode while allowing ions to pass through.

The team grew forests of coated nanowires to create microdevices with greater surface areas than

conventional thin-film batteries.

Ajayan claims the key to efficient electrochemistry in batteries is to bring electrodes into close proximity, while still separating them.

By increasing the height of the nanowires, the researchers found it was possible to scale up the amount of energy stored in the unit while keeping the lithium ion diffusion distance constant.

They have built one-centimeter square microbatteries that hold more energy and that charge faster than planar batteries of the same electrode length. The three-dimensional technology allows more energy to be delivered in the same footprint. â– The abstract of the research can be found at http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1 021/nl102919m

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www.m2mconnectivity.com.au 12 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

ENVIRONMENTAL

Boosting light absorption of solar cells RESEARCHERS from Iowa State University and the Ames Laboratory have developed a way to improve the efficiency of polymer solar cells by increasing light absorption.

The researchers, led by assistant professor Sumit Chaudhary, found a way to produce a thin and uniform light-absorbing layer on textured substrates which boosts solar cell efficiency by 20 percent.

The results were published by the journal Advanced Materials.

The uniformly thin nature of the light-absorbing layer means it can go

up and down flat-topped ridges which are less than a millionth of a metre high, so even the ridges in the material captures more light.

According to Chaudhary, tests indicated the light-trapping cells captured 100 percent more light at the red/near infrared band edge.

Chaudhary claims the real breakthrough is in the production technology. Previous attempts to use textured substrates in polymer solar cells failed as they required extra processing steps or technically challenging coating technologies. â–

TECHNOLOGY

CONSUMER

Wireless mind control gaming EMOTIV Systems’ EPOC brain control headset is using Nordic 2.4GHz transceivers for wireless mind-controlled gaming.

The Emotiv EPOC wireless headset is capable of distinguishing between the unique electrical EEG brain pattern signatures produced when a wearer “thinks” of performing various computer gameapplicable actions, pulls certain facial expressions, or experiences certain emotions.

The headset can detect up to 13 action intentions including left/right, push/pull, lift/drop, rotate, and vanish, all in real-time.

The sensors can operate through human hair, without the use of conductive gels. During operation, brain wave data from the 14 independent sensors on the headset is transmitted to a USB wireless dongle using Nordic Semiconductor’s ULP 2.4GHz transceivers.

The headset also incorporates a

Brain-powered gaming requires no specialist training.

gyroscope to detect movement. It can also detect facial expressions and emotional states. Future games could be designed to respond to these cues, and on-screen characters can be

designed to mirror or react to gamer.

The headset needs no specialist training or equipment to operate, beyond a guided initial setup and learn procedure to ensure the sensors

are correctly positioned for adequate electrical contact.

“Each of the 14 EPOC sensors is taking 128, 16-bit sample ‘snapshots’ – every second – of the EEG brain wave signals resulting from the chemical activity of billions of active neurons in the brain measured on the μV scale,” explains Geoff Mackellar, Emotiv’s research manager and CTO. Nordic’s wireless data transceivers with their ultra low power operational characteristics allows the EPOC’s rechargeable lithium-polymer battery to run for up to 14 hours between charges.

Tan Le, co-founder and president of Emotiv, says this is just the start.

"One day, gamers may not need an input device like a joystick or gamepad at all to play a game, instead they will interact directly with the virtual gaming world by using the power of thought alone.” ■ www.emotiv.com www.nordicsemi.com

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COVER STORY

DESIGN

Thermal management heats up

The pace of innovation risks stalling as engineers grapple with the challenge of keeping sma oore’s Law dictates that each new generation of processors pack more transistors into a smaller area and run at higher clock rates. The result is the powerful computers and mobile devices we take for granted. But no matter how talented semiconductor engineers are, even they can’t cheat the laws of physics.

Those laws mandate that faster chips with ever-larger numbers of transistors require more power, and, as even the best chips aren’t 100 percent efficient, some of that power is wasted, generating unwanted heat.

The amount of power sucked up by a modern processor isn’t trivial.

For example, single core processors running at multi-gigahertz speeds (of the type used in servers or desktop machines) can consume up to 90W. The trend towards multi-core devices has reduced that peak power demand somewhat, but even these processors can generate around 65W. The thermal management industry is under increasing pressure to cater to this progress. Industry observers say cooling solutions need to be more efficient, compact and cheap – and they’re needed soon.

M

Spreading the heat Traditional thermal management solutions rely on passive heat dissipation using heatsinks made from conductive materials such as aluminium or copper. To deal with the increasing heat output of modern electronics, the manufacturers have tended to adopt a “larger is better” approach, opting to up the amount of conductive material, fin size or airflow to dissipate more heat. Server centres bear witness to this policy; the newest racks are the noisiest due to the larger volume of airflow from their cooling systems.

Aluminium or copper heatsinks work by abutting the hot component and conducting heat away to fins

SHORTCUTS: The thermal management industry is under increasing pressure; some analysts suggest they’re currently hindering the pace of innovation ■ Devices with hot spots greater than 20W need some form of active cooling ■ Fans have the disadvantages of increased cost, weight and noise; they can also compromise reliability ■ Combining passive and active heat-removal components is common.

For example, portable computers typically use one or more fans, a heat pipe and a heat exchanger ■ Thermofluidics is claimed to not only improve cooling efficiency and reduce weight and complexity compared to conventional cooling solutions ■

‘Too hot to handle’ should be a compliment regarding the device’s bleeding-edge functionality rather than a literal description of its operational temperature. (Courtesy: Bluetooth SIG)

that are then cooled by passing air.

One disadvantage is that there is a relatively high thermal resistance at the interface between the heatsink and the chip (this is sometimes overcome by adding a thermally-conductive paste to the contact faces of the components). Another has to do with the amount of space the heatsinks take up. While a server rack might be able to accommodate a large chunk of aluminium, this is impractical for a portable computer or mobile handset.

Perhaps more importantly, portable computers and handhelds make contact with the user’s skin, which imposes constraints on how hot the casing can become. 50°C is at the upper limit of human comfort, and skin damage can occur at 55°C. If the ambient temperature is 25°C,

14 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

then a temperature gradient of just 25°C is available to radiantly transfer heat from the system to the outside. That’s a tall order for a small device – especially one that can’t accommodate forced cooling due to power constraints and/or cost.

One option available to the electronics designer to enhance passive cooling to turn to a material with different thermal characteristics than aluminium or copper in order to “spread” the heat over a wider area. This technique lowers the temperature of a particular hotspot without resorting to large blocks of metal machined with exotic fin configurations. A good candidate is graphite. Graphite is anisotropic, conducting heat efficiently along its x and y axes, but poorly in the z axis.

For example, the 2-D thermal

conductivity of graphite is around 500W/m-K – similar to copper whereas in the third dimension conductivity is less than 10W/m-K. A thin graphite heat spreader can conduct heat longitudinally away from the source. For example, the heat from a 50°C hotspot can be uniformly spread across the graphite so that the hotspot drops to 45°C. That might not sound like much, but it’s the difference between a handheld being too hot to hold and being comfortable in the user’s palm. As a bonus, for the same thermal conductivity as copper, graphite is about 80 percent lighter. However, it’s brittle and requires careful handling.

Graphite spreaders reach their maximum heat-dissipating capability at about 20W (although advances in material technology will improve this figure). As a rule-of thumb, devices with hot spots greater than 20W need some form of active cooling.

Though semiconductor vendors have developed workarounds to compensate for cooling-capacity deficiencies (for example, by developing multi-core technology to maintain computing power while avoiding the high temperature hotspot of a single

COVER STORY

aller, faster chips cool core) it’s proving increasingly difficult for electronics products to stay under that 20W limit.

Creating a breeze One tried–and-trusted solution to enhance the extraction of heat from a compact device is to employ forced cooling – i.e. increasing the airflow through the heatsink’s fins allowing more heat to be extracted per unit time – using a fan. The fan selected determines the airflow and thereby the heat transfer coefficient of any cooling surface.

Efficient fans generate just the required amount of airflow to ensure the electronics remain below the specified heat threshold. Excessive airflow costs power, increases noise and risks exceeding the maximum allowable exit air temperature.

Fans have the disadvantages of increased cost, weight and noise; in addition, as mechanical units, fans can compromise the overall reliability of the product. One way to minimise noise is to reduce the system’s airflow resistance so a smaller capacity and quieter fan can provide the same airflow as the previously selected larger capacity device.

Precise fan speed control also helps to keep the noise down. In the past, fan control was basic: a thermistor measured the temperature at a system hot spot, such as the processor, and once the temperature exceeded the design threshold the fan turned on and stayed on, running at full speed. Nowadays, thermalmanagement ICs take over the control role, allowing the fan to run at a speed that cools the hot spot down while keeping the revolutions as low as possible to reduce noise and power consumption while increasing reliability.

This improved control also adds flexibility to systems with multiple fans. For example, such a system can compensate for one fan’s degradation by increasing the speed of another.

Moreover, improved fan blade-

and motor-efficiency has further reduced noise and power consumption – so much so that some portable computer makers are citing reduced noise during operation as a market differentiator of their products.

The advances described above and other technical breakthroughs have allowed manufacturers to reduce the size of their offerings whilst still maintaining the airflow. Typical portable computer cooling fans range in size from 80 by 80mm to 50 by 50mm with thicknesses of 11 down to 5mm. But even these are too bulky for the latest generation of thin portable computers; hence the increasing availability of fans down to 8 by 8 by 3mm (for axial devices) and 9 by 9 by 3mm (for blowers).

Bearing breakdown is the main reason for fatal fan failure. However, the latest maglev systems are capable of an MTBF of 50,000 hours at 60°C.

Aluminium or copper heatsinks work by abutting the hot component and conducting heat away to fins that are then cooled by passing air. (Courtesy: Aavid)

Liquid cooling Even with increased flow from a fan, air has an upper limit as a working fluid for heat removal. When this limit is reached, electronics designers turn to liquid cooling. The technique is common in high power systems such as motor drives, inverters and IGBT modules.

The technique works by connecting the hot device to an aluminium (or other metallic) plate that contains pipes or channels through which a coolant liquid circulates. Pumped circulation transfers the hot liquid to a heat exchanger such as a radiator, or a liquid/liquid exchanger and returns the cooled liquid to the plate in a closed cycle.

Adding liquid cooling to a design considerably increases complexity and costs – and consequently is only used for PCB cooling when there are no alternatives. It is typically reserved for certain specific components that have very high heat dissipation in a small area; for example, microprocessors or other large chips

“To deal with the increasing heat output of modern electronics, the manufacturers have tended to adopt a ‘larger is better’ approach”

running at very high clock rates.

Liquid cooling imposes a maintenance overhead on the customer.

Water is the most commonly used liquid, but may require the addition of antifreeze such as glycol. Pure water has a higher heat capacity but is liable to cause corrosion demanding the use of chemical inhibitors, especially if the cooling loop is made of more than one metal.

The user may also be required to periodically change filters to prevent contamination build-up.

An alternative means of removing heat from a specific component is the

heat pipe. This is a sealed tube containing a heat transfer fluid that in ambient conditions is close to its boiling point. At the end of the pipe in contact with the hot component, the fluid is vaporised and travels to the cooler region of the pipe where it condenses and gives up its heat to an attached heatsink.

Such a “bi-phase system”, using the latent heat of vaporisation and condensation, removes much more heat than is possible with a singlephase medium such as liquid water.

Heat pipes can contain a capillary medium that acts as a return path for the liquid phase of the working fluid, or they may rely on gravity requiring the cooler end of the system to be constantly above the heat source (making this type inapplicable to mobile products).

Some thermal management companies are even embedding heat pipes into the base plates of otherwise conventional heatsinks. These embedded heat pipes help eliminate hotspots on the heatsink’s base plate >

www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 15

COVER STORY

DESIGN

Computers typically use one or more fans, a heat pipe and a heat exchanger (Courtesy: Asus)

ensuring it has an even temperature throughout. With uniform temperature the heatsink is more effective, presenting a lower overall thermal resistance between the relevant component and ambient.

Combining passive and active heat-removal components is common. Portable computers typically use one or more fans, a heat pipe and a heat exchanger. Using a heat pipe allows a fan to cool the processor without being near it.

What’s next?

Scientist and engineers are working on other thermal management techniques such as such as spray-cooling and advanced forms of liquid

cooling, but as yet, the products tend to be large, heavy and expensive.

Furthermore, there are many questions surrounding their reliability.

A further technique is thermofluidic technology. Thermofluidic technology uses the phase-change properties of a liquid working on a microor even a nano-scale. One thermofluidic heat spreader design sandwiches alternating liquid (typically pure water) and vapour channels together to form a 3-D heat transfer structure.

The technology is claimed to not only improve cooling efficiency and reduce weight and complexity compared to conventional cooling solutions but to also lower costs and extend system life. Thermofluidic

16 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

heat spreaders are targeted at processors, graphics processors, DLP projection devices and high-brightness LEDs, reducing or eliminating the need for bulky and noisy fans through improved cooling efficiency.

Keeping cool Many designers are finding that it’s no longer good enough to rely on thermal contact pads on the underside of surface mount devices, or heat conduction through contact leads or pads. Powerful, compact chips and electronics assemblies with increasing component densities demand well thought out thermal management strategies to control board temperature.

Fortunately there are several weapons in the engineer’s thermal management arsenal: among them are passive aluminium and copper heatsinks and graphite spreaders; miniature fans and heatpipes; exotic liquid cooling and thermofluidic technologies.

Nonetheless, designers are faced with some tough decisions on how to remove heat from powerful products that consumers expect to be compact, inexpensive and quiet. It’s the engineer’s unenviable task to ensure that “too hot to handle” is a compliment regarding the device’s bleeding-edge functionality rather than a literal description of its operational temperature. ■

FEATURE

COMMUNICATIONS

Delivering Australia’s nextgeneration broadband As the controversial NBN ignites debate, Electronics News looks the technical challenges of delivering broadband across the Australian continent USTRALIAN broadband is currently a hot topic, as the Labor Party persists with its plans to build and launch the National Broadband Network (NBN), while debate about the scheme rages in the political, business and technology spheres.

According to Government-issued information, the NBN will see fibre optic cabling run to at least 90 percent of Australian homes, schools and businesses, delivering speeds of up to 100Mbps. The other 10 percent of premises will be connected via high speed wireless and satellite, with promised speeds of 12Mbps or more.

According to the Internet Industry Association (IIA), the speed and capacity delivered by a fibre-based broadband network will encourage an information-based economy, with the potential to revolutionise healthcare delivery, facilitate social benefits and improve R&D capabilities.

Mark Robinson, APAC director of customer operation for communications services provider Reliance Globalcom, says a big advantage of the NBN is the access provided.

“By building an NBN, you can get some certainty around both the quality of the delivery, the timeliness and the available infrastructure,” says Robinson.

But not everyone is in favour of the ambitious NBN solution. The Opposition wishes to scrap the plans, with the money spent on improving the existing copper networks and investing in wireless technologies instead.

Such debates have prompted comparisons with the efforts of our Asian neighbours such as Japan and South Korea, which have successfully rolled out their own nation-

A

CONNECTED: CSIRO’s Ngara technology seeks to provide a wireless broadband solution for rural areas.

wide broadband networks.

However, comparisons with Australia’s Asian neighbours do not do justice to the challenge of rolling out a national broadband network on a continental landmass with a combination of densely populated urban areas and huge tracts of barely inhabited countryside.

While fibre deployment tends to be cost-effective in countries such as Japan and South Korea, the rapid falloff in population density in Australia’s rural regions and the large distances involved pose serious logistical problems here.

The US – although with a much larger population – also has urban population hotspots separated by

large distances and a low-density rural population, so perhaps provides a more useful comparison with Australia.

How the US does it Vikas Trehan, senior vice president of InfoVista’s Network Performance Management Business Line, knows plenty about the broadband situation in the US. His company provides a unified platform for service providers and enterprise IT organizations to monitor and ensure availability and quality of service on the infrastructure, services and applications they deliver.

Speaking to Electronics News, Trehan said, like Australia, the US

SHORTCUTS: Fibre-based broadband will provide the speed and bandwidth needed by most urban customers.

■ New wireless technologies will utilise existing infrastructure to deliver broadband to rural areas.

■ Flexibility and quality of service will be key considerations in the provision of broadband.

■

has a combination of technologies, including copper, fibre and various flavours of wireless. AT&T, for example, utilises VDSL copper technology for Internet access. >

www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 17

FEATURE

COMMUNICATIONS

“[Copper] lowers [AT&T’s] investment, because there’s already a line running to the home,” Trehan says.

In contrast, another US service provider, Verizon, has a fibre-to-thehome approach. Subscribers to its IPTV and Internet services get an optic cable run to their premises.

Wirelessly, US consumers tend to use 2G/3G while mobile, then revert to wired technologies on their return to the office or home.

Based on this experience, Trehan recommends a blend of wired and wireless technologies.“In both the US and Australia there are pockets of urban markets, and then there are rural markets. I think taking a combination approach to technology is pragmatic,” concludes Trehan.

Quality of Service In October 2010, the NBN Company proposed to build just 14 initial points of interconnect, which has sparked debate over market competition issues. Reliance Globalcom’s Mark Robinson says the main concern should be over resiliency and redundancy.

“The more points of interconnect, the more the reliability and competition you can have in the backhaul,” Robinson told Electronics News.

“When you have a lower number of points of interconnect, you aggregate more into single providers. And a single provider, to me, signals single points of failure.”

Technology-wise, however, wireless faces even greater challenges in terms of quality of service.

As the number of users accessing wireless increases, the speed decreases. The farther away users are from the tower, the weaker the signal becomes, necessitating more transmission towers and base stations as demand grows.

Trehan says many of the towers were originally designed for voice, so constant upgrades are needed.

“Service providers have been upgrading them over the years, but there’s more and more [demand for] data. Now service providers have to upgrade their backhaul network in order to bring a large volume of data from the towers back to the data packet core,” explains Trehan.

18 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

CABLED: Fibre optic cabling is expensive to run to rural properties.

Despite these potential issues, wireless technology should not be dismissed as a solution for delivering broadband to rural areas in lieu of the costly effort of running fibre to remote estates.

New technologies Dr Jay Guo, leader of CSIRO’s Broadband for Australia research theme, says wireless is eminently

suited for regional Australia, since it can be rolled out more quickly and cheaply than a fibre network.

“Since most rural regional areas have sparse populations, the wireless solution will be much cheaper,” Guo told Electronics News.

CSIRO is actively engaged in developing wireless technologies, as it sees significant potential benefits for the rural regional areas.

FEATURE

It is taking on the wireless challenge with a two-pronged approach.

The first is the technology which will provide premises with internet access over long distances. The second is the wireless backhaul that will connect the wireless towers to the fibre backbone.

TV to Internet CSIRO’s Ngara wireless access technology uses existing television broadcasting towers to send signals in the form of focused beams to individual households. Users connect a modem to a modified version of their existing TV antenna.

The organization says its patented technology results in a spectral efficiency three times that of the closest comparable technology at 20bps per Hertz, delivering an individual data rate of 12Mbps for six users in the space of one television channel, with the potential for improvements..

“The energy is focused so [the signal] can travel a much longer distance. The capacity is not shared by all the users; every single user will have a [dedicated] beam to connect to the base station, and hence all users enjoy the same data rate simultaneously,” Guo says.

Ngara reuses the analogue TV spectrum, which is being phased out for digital TV. But the real efficiencies will be in the roll-out costs.

“By reusing existing broadcasting towers, we save [site acquisition] costs. We will also need fewer base stations compared with traditional wireless solutions.”

To ensure quality of service, Guo says CSIRO is aiming to develop technology that maintains the data rate in the coverage area, regardless of the distance the premises are from the base station. Part of the solution is based on the fact that Ngara works with an antenna on a stationary house, as opposed to the moving targets of mobile Internet solutions.

“We can ascertain the position accurately, and using this informa-

tion, we can do various things like synchronisation. And because the antenna is on top of the house, the fading is milder than with a mobile scenario,” says Guo.

Backhaul But there remains the problem of base station antennae in high towers that are themselves in rural areas.

“You need to have high capacity backhauls, otherwise standalone access does not solve any problems or provide any meaningful service,” Guo explains.

The current wireless backhaul technology uses microwaves and works on only one channel, for a data rate of several hundred Mbps, falling far short of the 2Gbps rate needed to achieve connection speeds comparable to fibre network solutions.

Guo says CSIRO is working to on wireless backhaul with 10Gbps data rates. The technology senses available channels, then smartly aggregates them via signal processing which mitigates interference with other services. CSIRO is currently in the demonstration stages of its wireless broadband technologies, aiming to increase the bandwidth with each successive stage, with the goal of eventual commercialisation.

Flexibility vital The challenge of delivering quality broadband across the Australia can best be met with flexible application of technologies. Vendors also need consider quality of service, which will be instrumental in ensuring the hallmarks of broadband technology – constant availability and speed.

While political wrangling and commercial pressures cloud the debate, it’s certain technology will keep advancing the speed and reliability of the pulses of light and electromagnetic waves that underpin modern communication. ■ www.relianceglobalcom.com www.infovista.com www.csiro.au www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 19

DESIGN CORNER

DESIGN

Wireless sensors without batteries Wireless sensors are often used in inaccessible places where changing batteries is impractical. Energy harvesting can solve the problem of providing power without primary cells nergy harvesting can provide enough energy to replace the batteries of wireless sensors, but the technology can’t provide sufficient power to meet peak demands. Energy harvesting can produce about 1 to 10mW, where the active sensor-transmitter combination may need 100 to 250mW for short periods.

Harvested energy must be stored when possible, ready for use by the sensor-transmitter, which must operate at duty cycle that does not exceed the energy storage capabilities of the system.

Likewise, the sensor-transmitter may need to operate at times when no energy is harvested.

Finally, if the stored energy is depleted and the system is going to shut down, the system may need to carry out housekeeping tasks first.

This may include a shutdown message, or storing information in non-volatile memory. Thus, it is important to continuously gauge available energy.

E

Energy harvesting system Figure 1 shows a complete energy harvesting system using an LTC35881 energy harvester and buck regulator IC, two LTC4071 shunt battery chargers, two GM BATTERY GMB301009 8mAh batteries and a simulated sensor-transmitter modelled as a 12.4mA load with 1 percent duty cycle. The LTC3588-1 contains a very low leakage bridge rectifier with inputs at PZ1 and PZ2 and outputs at VIN and GND. VIN is also the input power for a very low quiescent current buck regulator.

The output voltage of the buck regulator is set by D1 and D0 to 3.3V. The LTC3588 is driven by an Advanced Cerametrics Incorporated PFCB-W14 piezoelectric transducer, which is capable of generating a maximum of 12mW. In our imple-

Figure 1. Complete piezo-based energy harvesting system is independent of the grid. This design uses thin film batteries to gather energy collected by the piezo for a wireless sensor transmitter, which operates on a 1 percent duty cycle. mentation, the PFCB-W14 provided about 2mW of power.

The LTC4071 is a shunt battery charger with programmable float voltage and temperature compensation. The float voltage is set to 4.1V, with a tolerance on the float voltage of ±1 percent, yielding a maximum of 4.14V, safely below the maximum float allowed on the batteries.

The LTC4071 also detects how hot the battery is via the NTC signal and reduces the float voltage at high temperature to maximise battery service life.

The LTC4071 is capable of shunting 50mA internally. However, when the battery is below the float

20 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

voltage, the LTC4071 only draws approximately 600nA of current from the battery.

The GM BATTERY GMB301009 batteries have a capacity of 8mAh and an internal series resistance of around 10 ohms.

The simulated sensor-transmitter is modelled on a Microchip PIC18LF14K22 and MRF24J40MA 2.4GHz IEEE 802.15.4 radio.

The radio draws 23mA in transmit and 18mA in receive. The model represents this as a 12.4mA, 0.98 percent duty cycle (2ms/204ms) load, set with a self-clocked digital timer and a MOSFET switching a 267 ohm resistor.

SHORTCUTS: Wireless sensors in inaccessible positions benefit from the elimination of primary batteries It’s important to continuously gauge the available energy of an energy harvesting system With a few easy-to-use components, it’s possible to build a complete compact energy-harvesting power subsystem

DESIGN CORNER

lator, assuming an average VIN of 9.2V (see Figure 2), and a buck quiescent current of 8μA, the average current consumed by the system without charging the battery is:

Figure 2. Charging with sensortransmitter load Figure 3. Discharge with battery under-voltage disconnect

Modes of operation This system has two modes of operation: charging-sending and discharging-sending. In chargingsending mode, the batteries are charged while the sensor-transmitter presents a 0.5 percent load. When discharging, the sensor-transmitter is operating, but no energy is being harvested from the PFCB-W14.

Harvested energy can drive the sensor-transmitter at a 0.5 percent duty cycle with about 120μA left to charge the batteries. The GMB301009 batteries have a capacity of 8mAh, so they completely charge from empty in about 75 hours.

Discharging-Sending When the PFCB-W14 is not delivering power, the voltage at VIN drops to approximately:

Charging-Sending When active, the PFCB-W14 delivers power at an average of approximately 9.2V x 180μA ≈ 1.7mW. The available current must charge the battery and operate the buck regulator driving the simulated sensor-transmitter. The active sensor-transmitter draws 12.4mA x 3.3V ≈ 41mW at around 1 percent of the time, or

So the reflected load current calculation changes to:

Figure 4. Battery disconnect recovery on charge

about 0.41mW on average, leaving some current to charge the battery.

Taking into account the 85 percent efficiency of the LTC3588 buck regu-

The quiescent current of the buck regulator is higher because the regulator must switch more often to regu-

www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 21

DESIGN CORNER

“Harvested energy must be stored when possible, ready for use by the sensor-transmitter” late from 7.5 versus 9.2V. At 78μA, with no energy harvested, the battery is discharged in approximately 115 hours. This indicates a charge storage capacity of >8.95mAh. These batteries when brand new could store approximately 12 percent more charge than rated.

A more serious problem is what happens when the battery is fully discharged. If current is drawn after the state of charge reaches zero, and the battery voltage drops below 2.1V, the battery is permanently damaged.

Therefore the application must ensure that the battery voltage never falls below this limit. For this reason, the battery cut-off voltage is set to 2.7 or 3.2V to ensure some energy remains in the battery after the disconnect circuit has engaged.

Simply stopping the transmitter or disconnecting the load will not protect the battery, as the LTC4071 draws a quiescent current of approximately 600nA. Although this is extremely low, the total load, including the LTC3588-1, is nearly 2μA. A fully discharged battery will only be able to supply approximately 100μA before its voltage drops enough to damage the battery.

A disconnect circuit is necessary to ensure that the battery does not discharge in a reasonable amount of time. The LTC4071 provides an internal low battery disconnect circuit.

22 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

This disconnect circuit was measured to provide <2nA of battery load at room temperature when activated. This leakage is typically dominated

by PCB leakage. With only 2nA of battery drain current, the battery could survive for 50,000 hours in the disconnect state before the battery is damaged.

In Figure 3, the second battery (BAT2) is seen to disconnect 50 hours after BAT1 due to the 2μA load.

LTC4071. This charges the batteries until the reconnect threshold is reached, allowing batteries BAT1 and BAT2 to be reconnected. Looking at Figure 4, this can be seen as the voltage at VIN snaps down to the battery stack voltage.

Since the voltage at VIN is now VBAT1 + VBAT2 + (180μA x 15k) = 6.2V, the buck regulator on the LTC3588 restarts and 3.3V is once again available.

Measured results

Conclusion

The system shown in Figure 1 was measured in both operating modes: discharging-sending (Figure 3) and charging-sending (Figure 4).

With a few easy-to-use components, it is possible to build a complete compact energyharvesting power subsystem for wireless sensor-transmitters. In this particular system a piezoelectric transducer supplies intermittent power, while two batteries store energy for use by the sensor-transmitter. An integrated disconnect switch protects the batteries from overdischarge.

This system can fully charge the battery in 75 hours, even while operating the sensor-transmitter at 0.5 percent duty cycle.

The batteries allow the system to continue operating the sensor-transmitter at 0.5 percent duty cycle for 115 hours after the PFCB-W15 stops providing power. If longer battery operating time is required, the sensor-transmitter duty cycle can be reduced to accommodate this need. ■

Discharging-Sending: In Figure 3 the voltages of the two batteries BAT1, BAT2 and VBUCK are plotted against time with the batteries supplying all the system energy, with none coming from the PFCB-W14 piezo.

The batteries slowly discharge until BAT2 activates the LBO threshold of the LTC4071, whereupon the disconnect circuit activates and disconnects BAT2 from all circuitry except U5. This causes the voltage at VIN of the LTC3588 to drop below the UVLO for the regulator, and the regulator shuts off.

The load on BAT1 is the 2μA quiescent current of the LTC4071 and the LTC3588. This small load slowly discharges BAT1 until the low battery disconnect of LTC4071 is activated and BAT1 is disconnected.

Charging-Sending When the PFCB-W14 once again starts delivering power to the system, VIN rises to 7V, which forward biases the body diodes of the disconnect FETs in the

Further information: George H. Barbehenn is with Linear Technology. This article was originally published in Linear Technology’s “LT Journal of Analog Innovation” and is republished with permission.

Linear Technology’s products are available from Arrow Electronics, Tel: (03) 9737 4900, www.arrowasia.com.hk

FEATURE

DESIGN

PCB design for the future To the casual observer, PCBs appear to be a stable technology, but the vendors tell a story of ongoing evolution and tough technical challenges ahead BLURRED: There is increasing convergence of engineering and the board layout and routing process.

complexity and miniaturisation of electronics devices are the catalyst for the ongoing evolution of PCB design. But how are the suppliers of PCB design and prototyping tools coping with this evolution?

Two Australian companies are well positioned to answer this question. SATCAM supplies software, hardware and consumables for the prototyping and manufacturing of PCBs and Altium is a global developer of solutions which aid engineers in designing and building next generation electronic products.

Electronics News spoke to both companies for their expert opinions.

G

Smaller, hotter According to SATCAM manager Rob Leslie, PCB designers are continuing to pack more components into ever smaller volumes. Leslie says this increased density usually equates to faster clock rates, resulting in higher currents that boost stray capacitances. While it’s possible to reduce operating voltages, this comes at a cost of a decreased signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). “[In addition,] small devices and high powers means that the board designer has to think about heat flows as well as current flows, sometimes using exotic ceramic and/or aluminium-clad PCB materials,” Leslie told Electronics News.

Altium’s product marketing manager Rob Irwin agrees that miniaturisation and increasing density are driving PCB design trends, but adds that there’s now a blurring of lines between the engineering process and the board layout and routing process.

According to Irwin, components are benefiting from large scale integration, lowering the actual component count on the boards. At the same time, components are getting smaller, and increasing clock speeds

SHORTCUTS: Integrating functions into single components can reduce the actual parts count on PCBs, but have special mounting requirements.

■ Heat dissipation needs from faster clock rates and high power means an increased need to access both the board design and overall device engineering domains.

■ Information management is essential for designers, but can be handled by software.

■ A divide between design and the manufacturing process means prototyping remains an important step.

■

generate more heat which means the chips demand special mounting requirements that must be addressed at the board level to ensure the devices function reliably.

“Many ICs these days have areas of the chip exposed in the package to allow for heat dissipation,” Irwin explains. “At the board level the designer needs to ensure that the

necessary area of copper is exposed as part of the component footprint.

“Thermal issues are both an electrical problem, in terms of power consumption and losses, and also a mechanical problem, in terms of channelling heat away from hotspots,” Irwin continues. “To solve many of these problems designers need access to both design domains.”>

www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 23

FEATURE

DESIGN

Prototyping

HARDWARE

An alternative approach

PACKED: More components are being placed into smaller volumes.

The NanoBoard allows customisation of the physical host of the design.

ACCORDING to Altium, an intriguing area of development with Altium Designer is with FPGA-hosted system designs running on NanoBoard hardware.

The NanoBoard is an “intelligent” FPGA development board which integrates closely with the software environment. It includes a touch screen and supports multiple swappable ‘daughter boards’.

Altium provides a range of royaltyfree, ready-to-use FPGA-based IP for developing complete and working systems. These can then be downloaded to the FPGA on the NanoBoard and configured.

Altium says designers can quickly iterate through the design-build-test cycle without having to manufacture any physical hardware or prototypes.

The NanoBoard allows customisation of the physical environment that hosts the design.

During deployment, Altium offers a range of modular enclosures that fit the NanoBoard.

The designer can avoid the complexities of manufacture for oneoff or short production run devices where a custom board and enclosure is not necessary.

Information tsunami Irwin’s comment alludes to a major challenge for PCB designers; the amount of information needed on thousands of different component threatens to overwhelm even the most organised professional.

Vendor websites, data sheets and reference designs on specific chips are valuable resources, but as the volume of data grows, Altium believes vendors will need to change their information delivery to push component information and support directly into the design environment.

“The design system should be able to pull directly from the web all the necessary information and physical and software IP to implement the chip at the board level, the programmable device level and the software level,” says Irwin.

But PCB designers can’t be experts in all fields. PCB design software will need to automate processes across design domains, allowing the creation of a “unified data model” of the entire device.

Convergence According to Irwin, PCB designers are designing circuit components such as touch sensors directly onto the PCB in order to keep costs down.

“The challenge for board designers is dealing with creating and scaling the complex shapes

24 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

needed to implement the components, ” Irwin says. Altium Designer, for example, includes a library of parameterized touch sensor controls allowing a ‘place and configure’ approach to the task.

Altium is also seeing a convergence of board functionality into FPGA, due to the affordability and increased functionality of those devices. Expiring patents on FPGA technology is also stimulating interest in PCB-FPGA co-design.

“A lot of designers are looking at FPGAs and comparing the cost of using them as system platforms versus the cost of a discrete 32-bit microcontroller and associated peripheral chips,” Irwin eplains.

However, FPGA design has traditionally been the realm of specialist designers, and FPGA vendor tools require the knowledge and skills associated with IC and ASIC design.

Irwin says Altium is trying to help by driving for FPGA design to be unified with the board design process, so that designers can apply the system and circuit design skills they have acquired at the board level to the programmable hardware domain. Toward this end, the company’s Designer software provides a high level “component”based graphical approach to the creation of system functionality in the FPGA.

Despite the advances made with PCB design and simulation software, SATCAM’s Rob Leslie says Murphy’s Law means a physical prototype is still an important part of the development process.

“It is not unusual to find dimensional errors in component data sheets, and no amount of simulation will avoid such challenges,” explains Leslie. “Prototyping is as much about mechanical fit and potential manufacturability as it is about functionality and performance.”

Leslie is seeing a divergence in prototyping, with many designers turning to modular prototyping to evaluate the performance of sections of a project.

There is also increasing demand for assembled, working prototypes within a few hours of completing the PCB layout design.

To cater for this, SATCAM has released the T-Tech Quick Circuit QCJ5 PCB design system, which has a vacuum table and automated tool change feature for quick machining of thin and/or flexible circuits.

Altium, on the other hand, argues that its software is a good alternative for checking for full fit and mechanical clearance. Altium Designer has a native 3D PCB design environment, so the board design is stored and worked on as a fully-editable 3D model. Designers can import 3D models of enclosures to check dimensions without a physical prototype.

Altium Designer also includes a full set of CAM tools within the design environment, so users can process the board for typical manufacturing issues and clean up the files before going to manufacture.

However, Altium’s Rob Irwin agrees on the importance of physical prototypes, but advocates prototypes made on the contract manufacturer’s machines, because even at a stage where the final board can be accurately modelled in detail, there still

FEATURE

remains a data divide between design and manufacture.

“There’s currently no guarantee that the data the manufacturer is using accurately reflects your design data in every detail,” Irwin said, “The design data is massaged and reformatted to reflect the manufacturing equipment used.”

The lack of certainty regarding this translation process means prototypes are needed prior to committing to large production runs.

While a possible solution would be to directly connect CAD systems to manufacturing or prototyping systems, Irwin says manufacturers are resisting this, as preparing data for manufacture is a value-added service for them.

Additionally, Irwin claims the problem of design and manufacture disconnect is not resolved by in-

house initial prototyping, since the data will still need to be translated to work with the final contract manufacturers machinery.

Testing times Squeezed between the increasing demand for ever-smaller, more functional electronic devices and cost issues, today’s PCB designers face challenges of an entirely different level to that of their predecessors.

Convergences with FPGA and mechanical design, integration and scale complexity, thermal challenges and information management are some of the issues which PCB designers need to contend with.

Fortunately, fast prototyping tools and design software have evolved to keep up with these challenges. www.satcam.com.au www.altium.com

Advanced PCB prototyping system SATCAM is distributing the Quick Circuit QCJ5 PCB prototyping system.

The system from T-Tech allows quick PCB prototyping. It has three-axis motion, 12, 24 or 32 position automatic tool change, automatic depth control, and 60,000 or 10,000rpm variable speed spindle. It can produce resolutions of .006mm at traverse speeds up to 150 inches per minute.

Three axis motion control allows tasks like depanelling populated boards, repairing circuit boards, and pocket milling. Automated tool change allows unattended and uninterrupted runs, accelerating prototype circuit board creation by up to 400%.

Other standard features include PreTouch, CheckByTouch, a four-zoneselectable precision vacuum table, front panel control of common system commands, integrated sound enclosure, and a 254 by 330mm work surface.

PreTouch features a pneumatic pressure foot that applies evenly distributed pressure to secure the substrate prior to drilling or milling. This precise pressure regulation makes the system ideal for working with delicate, soft or flexible circuit board materials.

ContactByTouch automatic depth control allows users to enter depth of cut values directly into software data fields, eliminating the need for manual settings and feeler gauges.

CheckByTouch tool detection allows automatic tool replacement. Should a tool break, the system will automatically deposit the broken tool, pick up a new replacement and continue milling.

The system is used together with T-Tech’s IsoPro 3.0 software for automated precision rapid prototyping. This software allows engineers to view and edit standard CAD output, create single or multiple isolation paths, and specify partial or complete copper removal.

www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 25

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FPGA adapter modules NATIONAL Instruments has introduced four new NI FlexRIO FPGA adapter modules, extending its PXI software-defined instrumentation.

Designed for test and measurement applications that require real-time performance and hardware signal processing, the new modules include the NI 5761, NI 5751, NI 5752 and NI 6583.

According to NI, the solutions combine a programmable PXI or PXI Express-based FPGA module and an I/O adapter module.

NI 5761 is a four-channel, 14-bit, 250 MS/s broadband high-performance digitiser adapter module designed for signal processing in communications system design, IF acquisition, MIMO, radar and scientific research.

NI 5751 is a 16-channel, 50 MS/s, 14-bit module for test and measurement in areas such as experimental physics, NDT and medical imaging.

NI 5752 is a 32-channel, 50 MS/s, 12-bit module optimized for NDT and ultrasound applications. It includes AC-coupled differential inputs with integrated VGAs and time-varying gain curves, as well as 16 digital outputs for pulser stimulus.

NI 6583 is a 32 single-ended and 16 LVDS/mLVDS channels, digital adapter module with data rates up to 300 Mbit/s for test and communication requiring mixed digital logic.

Strain gauge converter WEIDMULLER has launched the ACT20P Bridge strain gauge converter for industrial applications.

The unit was designed and developed in Australia, and is manufactured locally using quality parts and sophisticated technology.

The product features the latest

microprocessor technology, and is compact and lightweight, with a width of 22.5mm and weight of 150g.

Via a 10-60Vdc power supply, the ACT20P Bridge powers the strain gauge using selectable 5 or 10V excitation supply. The device converts the mV signal to an industry standard of 0-(4)-20mA, or 0-10V signal with an accuracy better than 0.05% within an operating temperature range of -40-+70ºC. According to the company, the device can be configured quickly and simply. It has a push button calibration feature with the ability to skip previous calibrated points.

All calibration points are stored in non-volatile memory A tare or zero offset function can be activated from the front panel or by external contact closure.

The unit is housed in a double insulated, TS35 din rail mount with removable coded terminals.

Weidmuller info@weidmuller.com.au www.weidmuller.com.au >

National Instruments www.ni.com info@ni.com

Smallest 2A bridge rectifier ZOWIE, distributed by Apex Electronics, has announced the sample availability of the smallest 2A bridge rectifier in the industry, the MBCR20JLH. The low-loss mini bridge rectifier can be used for the input rectification of power adaptors, battery chargers, power supplies and

compact lighting, as well as for power supplies in consumer appliances and industrial applications.

The product was developed with the company’s advanced Low-Profile Superchip package and Low Vf Glass Passivated Rectifier Chip technology.

The manufacturer claims for the miniature SMD package, the advantages of using MBCR20JLH include 0.95V (max) forward voltage and 60A surge current. The maximum junction temperature is up to 175°C. The package is pin-to-pin fully compatible to the industry standard ABS package. It is designed to replace traditional DIP bridge rectifiers for the compact design of nextgeneration power supplies.

APEX Electronics mike@apexelec.co.nz www.apexelec.co.nz

Upton Australia has been appointed as an authorized OK International distributor for genuine Metcal and OKi branded products.

OK International is a leading global supplier of products for production assembly equipment. The product range includes SmartHeat® soldering and desoldering systems, advanced array package rework equipment, fluid dispensing and fume extraction solutions.

Unit 2, 132 Bayfield Rd Bayswater - VIC 3153 - Tel: +61 3 9738 2224 sales@uptonaustralia.com.au - www.uptonaustralia.com.au - www.okinternational.com

www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 27

NEW PRODUCTS

SPOTLIGHT

Card module retainers PENTAIR Technical Products has announced the Calmark 223 and 224 Card-Lok Retainers which prevent board damage and provide secure hold.

The product employs a screw-actuated wedge action which locks the board module assembly in place with a standard hex wrench, establishing the secure hold required for military two-level maintenance systems.

During tightening, five audible clicks indicate that a safe, yet firm clamping force has been reached.

The torque-limiting design of the retainers applies no insertion and extraction force on board module assemblies, eliminating the risk of overtightening to prevent damage to both the board and the component.

The retainers are available in 5.72mm by 6.60mm and 5.33mm by 6.99mm profiles. The five-piece design provides clamping force of up to 350lbs. The resulting connection withstands shock and vibration.

Pentair Technical Products www.calmark.com info@calmark.com

Cable for solar modules TREOTHAM Automation has released the Solarflex-X PV1-F cable, said to be the ideal wire for solar modules.

The Solarflex-X PV1-F cable has

TÜV and VDE certifications. It is used in stand-alone and networked systems as a module or branch wire.

According to the company, both insulation layers are set-off coloured from each other for improved handling. The standard product has black sheathing on natural colour conductor insulation. It can be specified with red or blue sheathing to simplify local installation.

A version designed as a twin wire is also available.

The Solarflex-X PV1-F cable can operater in temperatures from -40°C to +90°C, and has a minimum bending radius of approximately 4 times the cable diameter.

The cable is UV, ozone, weather and hydrolysis-resistant, halogenfree, and has good resistance to oils and chemicals.

28 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

Treotham Automation info@treotham.com.au www.treotham.com.au

Heavy duty pressure transducers AMS Instrumentation & Calibration has released the NOSHOK 640 series precision heavy duty pressure transducers with serial interface.

The product features advanced diffused semi-conductor and sputtered thin film technology to provide maximum stability. It caters to ranges from vacuum to 15,000psi.

According to the company, the transducers are designed for industrial and laboratory applications requiring high accuracy and repeatability, such as research & testing, aeronautical, precision controls, power generation, and medical.

AMS Instrumentation & Calibration claims the temperature compensation system virtually eliminates temperature induced errors from 50°F to 104°F, and standard output is digital with an RS232, 8N1/9600 Baud serial interface.

AMS Instrumentation & Calibration sales@ams-ic.com.au www.ams-ic.com.au

Mini I/O connector system TYCO Electronics, represented in Australia and New Zealand by Soanar, has launched the Industrial Mini I/O connector system.

The system features two points of contact to maintain performance and increase reliability in high vibration environments.

The compact connector is approximately one-fourth the size of a traditional RJ-45 plug. A latching system prevents dislodgement during high vibration or collision.

The company claims its system is an excellent replacement for existing RJ-45 technology, as it occupies significantly less space while offering increased functionality.

The polarized, wire-to-board interface features two keying options to prevent mismating and consists of eight individual circuits to accommodate I/O signals. Electrical specifications include a current rating of 0.5 Amps and a 30 Volt rating on 0.635mm centerline spacing.

The product is suitable for industrial controllers, PLC’s, motion control and robotics in the industrial automation market.

Soanar info@soanar.com www.soanar.com

Touch screen panel PC BACKPLANE Systems Technology has announced iBase’s iPPC-1700 panel PC with Intel Core i7/i5 processor support.

The product supports the iBase MI953AF Mini-ITX motherboard with Socket G1 (rPGA 989) for Intel Core i7 / Core i5 processors.

The panel PC houses a 17" XGA (1280x1024) TFT touch-screen display with 16.7m colours. The touch screen panel conforms to IP65 specifications to protect it against both water and dust.

Two Gigabit Ethernet ports give the PPC advanced networking functionality and versatility, while four serial ports and digital I/O features

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Email your product news to editor@electronicsnews.com.au SPOTLIGHT

are useful in industrial solutions.

Delivering high performance and rugged computing, the iPPC-1700 Panel PC is suitable for applications such as digital signage and factory automation systems.

Backplane Systems Technology sales@backplane.com.au www.backplane.com.au

Motor control modules ARROW Engineering Design Service has launched the High Voltage Sensorless PMSM solution, based on the TI Cortex-M3 MCU. According to the company, the solution provides rapid-time-tomarket motor control modules based on its motor control intellectual property for brushless DC or permanent magnet synchronous motors.

Arrow implemented the Field Oriented Control algorithm to provide fast response for speed changes, high efficiency and quite operation during motor runs.

Features include a dedicated motor control MCU, PWM, ADC, QEI and Timer inputs and outputs, sensorless control, stepless speed adjustments, and manual control or remote control by RS232/485.

Arrow Electronics sales.australia@arrowasia.com www.arrowasia.com

Half-size single board computer ADVANTECH has introduced the Intel Atom N455/D525 ISA half-size single board computer PCA-6782.

The PCA-6782 features the latest

Intel Atom single core N455 and dual core D525 processors which have an integrated graphic and memory controller (GMCH) on the same chip, allowing higher performance and more power savings.

Advantech claims the PCA-6782 is very reliable and is resistant to heat or dust in extreme application environments, especially when equipped with the fanless single core Atom N455 CPU and a maximum of 2 GB of DDR2 667 MHz memory.

The SBC has an integrated graphic core based on Intelâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Embedded Gen 3.5+ graphic technology with 224 MB shared memory.

It is capable of handling complex and intense 2D/3D graphic processing tasks without an additional graphic card.

I/O includes three SATA ports for mainstream SSD, HDD and ODD connections, and legacy connections include one IDE, one PS/2, one FDD and one parallel port.

The unit also has a CF socket, a PC/104 expansion, one Gigabit Ethernet LAN for high networking capability, and two COM ports.

Advantech info@advantech.net.au www.advantech.net.au >

Next-gen oscilloscope EMONA has released the GDS-3000 series visual persistence oscilloscope, with next generation technology set to replace DSOs. The series is available at prices starting around $2000, allowing the average industrial, and educational user to access the technology.

VPO signal processing technology allows the oscilloscopes to display waveforms with various gray scales based on the occurrence frequencies, comparable to the traditional analogue oscilloscope display.

The oscilloscope contains 3-dimension waveform data, including amplitude, time and intensity, for each waveform spot, providing more useful signal information than a normal DSO digital storage oscilloscope can do.

According to the company, the high-speed FPGA parallel data processing enables the signal analysis of rapid events such as video, jitter, glitch and runt, significantly increasing the data processing speed and therefore increased waveform update rate.

The units include a 203.2mm screen with 800 by 600 pixel resolution. A video output port allows the transfer of the screen image to an external projector or monitor for remote monitoring or big screen observation.

Other features include a 4 windows split screen feature, window-navi tool, switching power measurement, and serial data bus measurement.

Besides edge trigger, the product also offers various trigger functions, including pulse width, rise time and fall time and delay by event.

Emona Instruments mbreznik@emona.com.au www.emona.com.au

www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 29

NEW PRODUCTS

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Benchtop trackers METROMATICS is distributing Huntronâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Tracker 2800 series, which are designed to complement conventional test instruments in the debug and troubleshooting process.

The trackers utilise a power-off test method known as Tracker Signature Analysis which eliminates the risk of further circuit damage from the application of power.

According to the distributor, the units are suited for todayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s mixed signal circuit cards where analogue and digital are mixed together. Many modern portable electronic devices use 3V or lower logic circuits, for which the low test voltage ranges of the products are eminently suited.

The 2800 unit features variable range parameters resulting in over 100 combinations of voltage, source resistance and frequency.

The 2800S tracker extends the capabilities of the 2800 to scan and compare up to 40 pins per channel using standard IC clips and cables. The comparison can take place manually or automatically.

The trackers have colour touch screens for control of selected features such as DC Voltage Source control, pin selection (2800S) and Channel A/B alternating rate. The screen has a very fast refresh rate approaching that of an electrostatic CRT display for quick screening of component pins.

Metromatics sales@metromatics.com.au www.metromatics.com.au

Variable DC accelerometers DYTRAN Instruments, distributed

by Metromatics, has released the 7600B series variable capacitance DC response accelerometers.

According to the company, the accelerometers are designed to directly replace piezoresistive units in new or existing applications.

The product utilises a capacitive sensing element and an advanced ASIC to simulate the operation of piezoresistive bridge. It combines an integrated VC accelerometer chip with high drive, low impedance buffering for measuring acceleration in aerospace, automotive, commercial and industrial environments.

Dytran Instruments says the accelerometers are suited for zero to medium frequency instrumentation applications. At its heart is a hermetically sealed micro-machined capaci-

tive sensing element, a custom integrated circuit amplifier, and differential output stages.

The titanium case is also hermetically sealed, with a M4.5 x 0.35 4-pin receptacle which can be mounted via two 4-40 screws.

The unit includes integrated regulation to minimise the effects of supply voltage variation and reduce the interference from temperature changes and thermal gradients.

While the 7600B series uses variable capacitance technology, they are powered with the same power supply as piezoresistive and strain gauge sensors, increasing compatiblity.

These units can also operate as a standalone VC accelerometers with differential output or be used in place of piezoresistive, bridge type accelerometers.

30 FEBRUARY 2011 www.electronicsnews.com.au

Metromatics sales@metromatics.com.au www.metromatics.com.au

PLC and colour HMI unit MICROMAX Sensors & Automation is now distributing the Unitronics Vision1040 PLC and 10.4 inch colour Human Machine Interface.

According to the distributor, the new solution allows machine manufacturers and system integrators to add both a colour touch-screen equipped with 9 programmable function key display and full PLC functionality to their systems.

Users will have access to up to 1,024 I/O options, a USB programming port, data logging, and built-in recipe capability, while keeping their budget under control.

Other benefits include reduced programming time and wiring.

For industrial control, the Vision1040 can use 24 auto-tuned PID loops to control temperature, level, and pressure, while the 16-bit, 65K SVGA colour touch-screen displays data, colour trend graphs, and alarm screens.

The memory holds 2MB of application logic, plus 1MB for fonts and 80MB for images. Micro SD card provides memory storage for data logging and backup, complete PLC cloning and other functions.

The unit supports digital and analogue I/Os. Snap-in and remote I/O modules enable direct temperature measurement inputs.

Micromax Sensors & Automation info@micromaxsa.com.au www.micromaxsa.com.au

Portable handheld oscilloscope FLUKE has introduced the ScopeMeter 190 series II handheld portable oscilloscopes for harsh industrial environments.

The portable oscilloscopes are four-channel units which are safety rated for CAT III 1000V/CAT IV 600V environments.

Fluke claims the four input channels are fully isolated from each other to perform differential floating measurements, making it suited for troubleshooting fixed-installation three-phase power electronic devices like variable speed motor drives.

The chassis is sealed from the environment with no cooling slots or fans to expose the internals. It is IP51 dust and drip proof rated for use on the factory floor and in the field.

The oscilloscope has a fast sampling rate of up to 2.5 GS/sec and 400 pico second resolution, helping users capture electrical noise and other disturbances to diagnose exactly what is going on.

Fluke Australia sales@fluke.com.au www.fluke.com.au

High-temperature accelerometer DYTRAN Instruments, distributed

by Metromatics in Australia, has released a high-temperature accelerometer, the 3310A. The low-profile accelerometer is designed for use in Environmental Stress Screening and mechanical shock testing applications where size and temperature range are critical.

The unit weighs 1.8g and has an upper temperature of +260°C. It uses a LINbO3 sensing element, which ensures greater stability over a wider temperature range.

Metromatics sales@metromatics.com.au www.metromatics.com.au

WEB DIRECTORY

To advertise email sarah.bateman@reedbusiness.com.au

Amtex Electronics www.amtex.com.au Established in 1979, Amtex Electronics has become a leading supplier of Power Supplies, Battery Chargers, DC-DC Converters & Lab Supplies for both standard and custom solutions. From our large inventory, quick-turn-around local assembly and backed by expert technical staff you can be assured of the right products, when you need them.

Please visit our web site or call 02 9809 5022 for further information.

ASD TECHNOLOGY www.asdtech.com.au ASD Technology is a premier supplier of quality RF/ Microwave, Millimeterwave, Fiber Optics and Satcom components and subassemblies. Our products include Amplifiers, Antennas, Attenuators, Adapters, Cable Assemblies, Circulators, Coaxial Connectors, Directional Couplers, Filters, Fiber Optic Links, Isolators, Limiters, Mixers, Noise Sources, Oscillators, Phase Shifters, Power Dividers Combiners, Splitters, Synthesizers, Switches, Terminations, Waveguide Components and more.

Aussirad Electronics www.aussirad.com.au • Potentionmeters Omeg-Panel-switched 1/4W-100W • Rotary encoders with LED • LED 12V Lighting Colours 3W-7W with dimmable options • JoystickPosition sensors- for robots-airbag • Resistors 1/8W to greater than 5000W braking types • Capacitors –Full range • Fans 12- 24-48V dc – AC24-380Vac • Diodes- Semiconductors-mA to greater than 250A • Solar Panels on / off grid Inquiries welcome

Faraday Pty. Ltd. www.faradayshielding.biz Faraday Pty Ltd is a specialist electromagnetic shielding company, which provides design, installation, and testing of shielding systems for Industrial, Medical and Defence EMI requirements. Faraday represents pre-eminent international companies including ETS Lindgren (EMCO / RANTEC / Holaday), AR Worldwide (Amp Research / AR-modular rf), Solar Electronics and TESEO.

au.element14.com Welcome to element14, the new face of Farnell.

With access to over 450,000 products, from 3,500 leading suppliers, element14 connects you to a world of electronic components.

We offer great value-added services such as local, free re-reeling, cut-to-length cable and peel packaging.

We also offer a leading information portal and community website for design engineers developed to bridge the information divide in the electronics design industry.Visit our website today!

JED Microprocessors Pty Ltd www.jedmicro.com.au

Lemo www.lemo.com

Koloona Industries www.koloona.com.au

JED makes Single Board Computers, LCD displays and accessories for scientific and industrial users. CPUs are Atmel AVR (ATmega32 to ATmega256) with 4 UARTs and up to 36 protected I/O. JED also sells Wilke’s Tiny Tiger with SBCs programmed in multi-tasking BASIC.

High quality circular connectors with the LEMO designed push pull mating. Harsh environment connectors rated to IP68.

Plastic connectors for the medical industry.

Coaxial, triaxial, quadrax, multi contact and fibre optic connectors. LEMO is accredited with ISO9001:2000 and all connectors are RoHS compliant.

Koloona Industries is a wholly owned Australian Company who have been Importing and Distributing Electrical & Electronic Components for 30 years.

Koloona specialise in High Quality Switching and Protection Components with many supportive products to complete the range. We pride ourselves on our ability to offer quick service and full technical and application support.

M Rutty & Co www.mrutty.com.au "Companies include Portescap miniature & speciality motors, Dunkermotoren advanced motion solutions, Mavilor - AC/DC motors and drives, Italtronic DIN rail enclosures and Bivar PCB hardware. Specializing in subracks & innovative high quality 19" enclosures".

SATCAM www.satcam.com.au Quick Circuit from SATCAM allows you to make your own prototype circuit boards • circuit board prototypes in hours • uses standard CAD output • mills, drills and routs – no chemicals • analog, digital, RF and microwave • engraves and mills panels • plated-through holes • LED illumination of work area • models with automatic tool change Shouldn't you have one on your bench?

Powerbox Australia www.powerbox.com.au Microchip Technology Inc. www.microchip.com/8bit • Low pin count and small form factor • Easy migration • Cost effective • Low power capability • Ease of use and quick development • Mutiple product options • Flexible flash program memory

"Powerbox suppling a wide selection of AC/DC Power Supplies, DC/DC Converters, Military Power Supply, Railway Converters, Security Power Supply, Euro Cassettes, External Power Supply, Medical Power Supply, Battery Chargers, Laboratory Power Supplies & DC/AC Inverters"

Easy access to over 350,000 Electronic, Electrical and Industrial products from over 2,500 of the world's leading manufacturers. Online users have instant stock availability and access to over 100,000 free datasheets. Delivery is free for all orders over $125 in Australia and New Zealand.

Wireless Design www.wirelessdesign.co.nz

Soanar Plus www.soanarplus.com Soanar Plus offers an on-line ordering service with more than 7,500 plus parts in stock and ready for next day delivery. Our site offers real-time pricing and availability, broken pack quantities, side by side comparison and datasheets. This website complements our FREE catalogue.

RS Components www.rsaustralia.com www.rsnewzealand.com

TekMark Australia Pty Ltd www.tekmark.net.au Authorised Distributor of Tektronix in Australia. enquiries@tekmarkgroup.com Key Products offered: Oscilloscopes • Logic Analysers • Real Time Spectrum Analysers • Signal Sources • Video Test Equipment • Access Networks’ Testers • Optical and Metallic TDR’s, Power Meters

Wireless Design provides RF testing and component solutions to the wireless industry.

• RF equipment rental (spectrum analysers, signal generators network analysers) • RF equipment sales new and used • RF components (cable assemblies, filters, RF adaptors, attenuators) • RF equipment calibration • Passive Intermodulation test equipment and components www.wirelessdesign.co.nz

www.electronicsnews.com.au FEBRUARY 2011 31