Konecranes chain analyzer

Last crawled date: 1 year, 10 months ago

In my design I placed two strain gauges on opposite sides on the water container, both for measuring vertical water displacement. 
By using two strain gauges; the top surface of the water can be determined. [If the crane was on an incline this would also be detected]

The strain gauges will be connected to an CU. [The CU is also connected to the Orbital wire conductors, on the rollers, for phase change synchronization]

The CU will detect any unusual resistance changes in the amplitude of the sine waves, when the strain gauge encounters a deficiency of a chain]

[This solution offers a real time dynamical volume measurement, with little processing power]

Water principle: 

A superhydrophobe can be used on the chain and pulley system, were it will be emerged in water. This would cause a minimal interaction between the water and the surface material. [During R&D you should check if air bubbles are in the ridges, if there are try using normal hydrophobe]

To overcome evaporation of the water, I propose to use a ionic compound to keep evaporation to a minimum. Also it would lower the freezing temperature and could be used at low temperatures. [Anti freeze could be such ionic compound]

Strain gauge principle: 

The strain gauge is glued on to a waterproof sheet. 
This sheet is glued to an aerogel or sponge material, that can be compressed when water presses against it. [The top of the aerogel or sponge material is not sealed, so that gas pressure can rapidly change] 

The top of the strain gauge is restricted, so that it can experience an bending moment from the changing water pressure. [Also the conductance will change]

Orbital wire conductors principle: 

On two rollers I have placed on each: two conducting rings. One ring on the front and the other on the rear. These rings are connected with conducting wire trough a channel in the roller. 
[The electrical signal passes from the CU, to the rear rod, to the rear orbital ring, trough the channel in the roller, to the front orbital ring, trough the front rod, and back into the CU.]

On the front ring there is also a gap. This gap causes the electrical signal to fall to zero when it is directly over the connecting rod. This can be used to determine the phase change in both rollers. [Which in turn can be used to measure the length of the chain section between the two rollers]

[Load cells]:

To get extremely high accuracy in my design, I offer optional load cells. These load cells would give the density for each chain. Also with the load cells, the CU could calculate how much the roller cylinders are bent. Which would cause the error of margin to become even smaller in determining the length of a chain section. [These load cells are connected via the Orbital rings. But instead of just one ring, each load cell has it's own orbital. There would be six rear Orbital rings, six load cells, and six front Orbital rings. This is where the use of the Orbital comes to light. The load cells are almost continuously able to give an electrical signal to the CU. Only during the gap there is no signal]


Budget:
€ 5.00 ~ Water container
€20.00 ~ 2 strain gauges [stain gauge + restrictor + earogel or sponge]
http://www.alibaba.com/trade/search?fsb=y&IndexArea=product_en&CatId=&SearchText=strain+gauge
http://www.alibaba.com/trade/search?fsb=y&IndexArea=product_en&CatId=&SearchText=aerogel
€10.00 ~ superhydrophobe
http://www.alibaba.com/trade/search?fsb=y&IndexArea=product_en&CatId=&SearchText=super+hydrophobic
€ 5.00 ~ conducting wire
€10.00 ~ control unit
[http://www.alibaba.com/trade/search?fsb=y&IndexArea=product_en&CatId=&SearchText=microcontroller]

Production costs below 50€ or ~$65 USD.
[without load cells]
http://www.alibaba.com/trade/search?fsb=y&IndexArea=product_en&CatId=&SearchText=strain+gauge+load+cell

margin of error:

Strain Gauges [volume measure] ±0.5%
a) Cracks
b) Serve nicks or gouges
c) Visible distortion
e) Deposits which cannot be removed
g) If interlink wear leaves a rough surface, this indicates that rapid wear is occurring and the chain should be rejected immediately

Superhydrophobe layer chain ±0.1%
d) Severe corrosion

Orbital wire conduction ±0.5% [optional load cells ±0.1%]
f) The gauge length measured over an 5, 7, 9 or 11 links as appropriate exceeds that of the unused chain by 2% if power driven


A note: I have considered using Magnetostriction, Piezoelectricity and Photon detection methods. But these solutions seem to fall into geometric computability problems. [Also the budget would need to be larger]