One and Co

One and Co

Archives for February 2020

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Composites Fabricating: Is the End of the Autoclave Near?

When a company like Boeing wants to make an airplane wing or fuselage panel, they rely on a traditional layup process and a high-heat autoclave. The autoclave applies heat and pressure to cure the multiple layers of carbon fiber inside an epoxy resin. The finished product ends up being a solid piece of carbon fiber reinforced plastic.

All of this is well and good, but autoclaves for such large parts are monstrous in and of themselves. Thanks to ongoing research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the need for high heat autoclaves may be coming to an end. Researchers have found a way to cure composite materials using carbon nanotubes and electricity. Their process completely eliminates the need for ovens and autoclaves.

Building an Airplane Fuselage

The Boeing 787, now considered the crowning jewel of the Boeing fleet, relies on an extensive amount of carbon fiber throughout. Needless to say that the 787 is a huge plane. Imagine what a monumental task it must be to construct fuselage panels for this aircraft.

A single fuselage panel starts as multiple layers of carbon fiber prepregs. As Rock West Composites in Salt Lake City explains, prepregs are carbon fiber fabrics that come from the factory already impregnated with resin. They are laid into a mold until the desired level of thickness is achieved. Then the mold is placed in an autoclave where heat and pressure cure the fabric and resin.

An autoclave large enough to accommodate fuselage panels is almost as big as a small warehouse. It consumes a ton of energy doing what it does. Between energy consumption and the sheer amount of floor space needed to house an autoclave, you are talking a major financial investment for Boeing. What if they could dispense with the autoclave altogether?

The MIT Research

Back in 2015, an MIT research team began working on a process whereby they could cure composite materials without the need for an oven or autoclave. They decided to go with electricity as the curing mechanism. Making it all work relied on creating a carbon nanotube film they could wrap around the composite layers. Introducing electricity to the film generated enough heat to cure the composites in place.

Researchers dubbed their process ‘out-of-oven’ curing. With it they were able to produce composite materials that were just as strong as those made with conventional layups and autoclave curing. More importantly, they did it with 99% less energy.

Fast forward some four years and a new team of MIT researchers is working to perfect the process. Much of their focus is on improving the carbon nanotube film. By improving its performance and introducing new capabilities, they believe they can dramatically simplify composites fabricating in the aerospace industry.

Implications for Other Industries

There is no telling how close MIT researchers are to perfecting their out-of-oven process. Yet by proving it works, they have set the stage for quite a revolution in composites fabricating. The implications go way beyond aerospace manufacturing.

Think about the automotive sector. They have been chomping at the bit to incorporate more carbon fiber in their designs. What has stopped them? Cost. If car makers could produce the carbon fiber parts they want with 99% less energy and without the need for ovens and autoclaves, it’s a lot easier to justify the cost.

Taking the autoclave out of the equation changes the game entirely. Throw in an automated process for laying down carbon fiber fabrics and you have an entirely new method for producing very large composite parts at a fraction of the cost.

 

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4 Ways To Improve Employee Morale

Employee burnout can often happen as a result of low morale. People aren’t productive, they aren’t motivated to show up, and they aren’t producing good work. Usually, turnover is high, resulting in valuable production time being used to train employees yet again.

The best way to tackle a low morale problem is first to accept that there is an issue and start thinking of creative ways to tackle it. Not only will you get the best possible performance out of your employees, but you’ll be happier as a manager with less to worry about.

Reward Good Performances

Rewarding employees’ performance is a critical step in making them feel motivated to do their best. You want your team to improve as they go rather than get comfortable where they are. The best way to make this happen is by offering incentives.

Rewards can be anything from delivering a fruit basket to offering theater tickets. Give them something that makes them motivated to perform at their maximum potential. When you can inspire greatness, then you know that you’re fulfilling your job as their leader.

Increase Communication

One of the most straightforward ways to boost employee morale is to improve the lines of communication. Be present when you talk to your team become sincerely invested in how they’re doing.

Check-in with how well their energy is doing and inquire whether there are any current challenges they’re facing. Offer to give them whatever tools they need to make their job easier.

Your employees should be valued and treated like assets. If you expect them to give you their best performance, then you’ll need to invest in how they’re feeling. Checking in once in a while is a critical part of leadership. Let them know that they matter and you care about their well-being.

Encourage Feedback

Often employees feel scared about sharing their ideas with their managers. If they feel like they can’t give their input, then you’ll never have an accurate reading on how well your team is doing.

Always encourage feedback and encourage creative thinking. You’ll get much more out of your employees if they feel like they’re an active part of the process.

Have a Little Fun

It’s essential to roll up your sleeves once in a while and take your corporate tie off. Encourage your team to have fun once in a while. Organizing something casual like an outing together to a restaurant or even going to an event together can get your team to open up.

When they start seeing you as a real person and not just a manager, they’ll be more inclined to give you their best work. Apply these tips and encourage growth, and you’ll have a great team on your hands in no time!

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Ode to the king single

The king single bed is the best mattress size ever conceived. You can keep your stubby double bed and your bloated queen bed; the king single is all a person ever needs. I have slept on every kind of bed in every different size, but nothing has played a constituent role in my life more than a king single bed.

What the heck am I talking about? I know, I sound crazy, spruiking the benefits of a… mattress size? Before you call the men in white suits to come scoop me away, let me tell you a little story.

Growing pains.

When I was a child, I slept on the top bed of a bunk; below me was my younger sister. We shared a room peacefully until I was 11 when I started to complained daily about a crawling pain in my legs and arms. I was so concerned I started to make my self sick with worry. Why was I feeling this? Was it a rare disease from space? Maybe my math teacher had a mysterious strain of flu and gave it to me when he marked my test?

My loving mother (bless her) would laugh at me, say that I was being dramatic, and it was only growing pains. Growin pains? What the? My rapidly changing man-child body was an awkwardly hilarious disaster for all around me as I bumped into things constantly, not used to my expanded extremities.

In the space of four months, I went from a chubby little boy who fit snugly in a single bed, to a gangly 6 foot something teenager. The rapid growth scarred my body with stretch marks, which are still visible today.

Graciously, before the onset of this change, I was given my own room, and we went bed shopping. An uninterested and constantly moody teenager was probably not the funnest shopping partner in the world, but still, my mother persisted as we hopped from Domayne to Harvey Norman, on a quest to find the perfect bed for her rapidly expanding son.

She was insistent on a double bed. On the outset, this size looked like the logical choice, double the width of my current bed, not too expensive and a popular size amongst teenagers, according to the teenaged salesperson. My mum was sold, myself not so much.

In my short career of growing taller, I had managed to crack the six foot two mark, and as such, as I lay on a double bed in the showroom, surrounded by my parents and a sweating salesperson, I realized it was too big. But I didn’t say anything, I kept quiet, and for years I slept diagonally on a double bed, too afraid to offend my mum, as they say, don’t bite the hand that feeds you!

King-sized revelations

I wasn’t even an adult, but I didn’t fit in my supposedly adult-sized bed. The ensemble was heavy and took up an awkward amount of space in my room. When I left home for university, I knew I needed to buy a new bed, and I thought queen-sized must be the way to go; after all, it was a double but longer, just what I needed. Or so I thought.

After some number crunching, doubt began to creep into my mind. A queen-sized bed is too big for my university accommodation. I was too poor to pay someone to deliver a bulky mattress. Was I doomed to live a life of awkward sleep?

For months, I tried to adjust to uni life, all while sleeping on an air mattress. Oh, what fun it was to remember scores of critical information while waking up on the hard ground after the mattress had deflated in the night. It was pretty grim, but when I think back on it, that pretty much summed up university.

Big (tax) break

An eye-opening first semester had drawn to a close, and I was free to wander the city streets and try and process some of the madness I had witnessed. Shortly after that, I realized it was futile and went to the mall. Good choice, it was a welcome respite from the bitter winter that had recently snuck in.

The heaters were pumping as hard as the sickly sweet love ballads coming from the stero system, it’s 11:30 in the morning, and the mall is swarming with shoppers. I treat myself to a donut and start to wander aimlessly, enjoying the strange juxtaposition of me, the poor uni student, and the mall, a shining temple of consumerism. Before I can get too deep and arty, a sign out the front of a department store catches my eye;

‘TAX TIME SALE: %50 OFF ALL MATTRESSES AND ENSEMBLES ‘

I browse the displays; queen beds stretch out before me. Even with the sales, these beds are too expensive, to.. excessive. And then I see it. The Rialto king single bed. This bed is what I had been missing my entire life. A bed that was comfortable long, while not being fat on the sides. I was about to cry in desperation at my lack of funds until the sign out the front replayed in bold font across my brain:

‘TAX TIME SALE”

It’s a sale, and its tax time. Its tax time. TAX TIME! Of course! My tax refund had come in for the previous year, it wasn’t much, but it was enough to buy the mattress. Some young men buy expensive cars, and others just want a good night’s sleep and buy a Sealy mattress instead. Yeah, I know I’m very uncool.

My love affair with this sized mattress grew deeper when I was able to fit it into my Camry and managed to get it home and set it up by myself. That night I had the best sleep of my ife, and the rest is history.

In a world where bigger is better, the king single is an interesting idea — something big, mixed with a healthy dose of restraint. King single beds are the perfect bed for a teenager, a single adult or even a couple who are severely strapped for cash (My girlfriend and I shared a king single for two years, and yes, we are still together) When it comes time to upgrade your mattress or ensemble, spare a thought to the king single, the king of the bed sizes.

 

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Technologies that changed the course of history

Throughout human history, there seems to be a distinct ebb and flow in human innovation. Usually, we see a paradigm shift in thinking, an idea so revolutionary it changes the way we think and live our lives forever. Always there are those opposed to a change in the status quo, and we see periods of human history that take a step backward from what we have learned (the dark ages anyone?)

Thankfully, as we march into the future, we see more innovation and less darkness. We are living in an age that may just see us give birth to artificial life. How did we get here? What technologies kick-started our ubiquity? What inventions can we thank for our prolific history and our bright future?

Printing press

For tens of thousands of years, we huddled in caves; fire was our greatest discovery. We invented language, animal husbandry, and learned to navigate using the night time sky. There are millions of individual ideas and inventions, but nothing kick-started our rise to global super species like the invention and spread of the printing press.

It’s hard to imagine a time when news wasn’t accessible instantly from your iPhone 11 pro, but before printed material, even a simple newspaper did not exist.

Invented around 1440, the printing press allowed the mass reproduction of printed material, and this gave birth to newspapers, magazines, and other consumable writings. Most importantly, the printing press allowed for easy circulation of information and, ultimately, the establishment of the scientific community.

A strong scientific community that could easily share ideas and information was paramount to the development of more sophisticated technology. Without the printing press, we would not enjoy the convenient lives we lead today.

Microchip

If the printing press changed the world in a hundred years, the microchip did it almost overnight. In the early ’70s, this stroke of design genius emerged, promising to shrink bulky, vacuum-powered electronics to a more manageable size.

There are too many ways in which the microchip changed human history to list here. Every piece of technology was miniaturized and made more efficient after the microchip was introduced, allowing us to enjoy handheld devices of astonishing power — devices like the smartphone.

Smart phone

Many people say that Apple introduced us to the smartphone, but it doesn’t really matter. The move towards handheld computers was well on its way before Apple graced us with the iPhone in 2004. The melding of touchscreen technology, as well as cellular connectivity, gave birth to perhaps the most significant piece of consumer technology in the earth’s history.

Has the smartphone made our lives easier or more fulfilling? The argument could go either way, but it seems they have complicated life further for many. Smartphones are so significant not for how they helped humankind, but how they have distracted us and changed the way we live forever.

What’s next?

If I could predict the future, I wouldn’t be writing these articles; I would be enjoying an extended vacation on a beach somewhere far away, growing fat on the lottery money I have won. Alas, I cannot predict the future, but we can make educated guesses as to where humanity is heading.

3D printing is starting to mature and is finding applications in the real world as we speak. As technology gets more sophisticated, the effects of 3D printing could be profound. Imagine being able to print new organs, or instantly replace a part in a broken machine by printing a new one. This future is not very far away and is very exciting, but only time will tell how it plays out.

Human history is intrinsically tied to technology, from early man discovering fire to modern man developing neck cramps from overuse of a smartphone, technology is what makes us human. What new wonders will our children witness? What technologies will emerge to reshape our world once more? Only time will tell.

 

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How to Plan a Great Birthday Party with Your Kid

When your child is still small, they agree with everything you do and love everywhere they go, but, as they get older, they become more opinionated and even stubborn. This is a natural process of growing up as they learn boundaries and independence. It is going to be a hard transition, but by following a few essential tips, you can grow alongside them and help them be their absolute best selves.

A great place to start this journey is with your child’s birthday party. Babies and toddlers, of course, will have no opinion on what they do, but as your kid gets older, it’s important to take the initiative and have them help you plan. Done right, they can have a great birthday and learn key skills; you just need to remember to follow these tips:

Save Up for their Birthday Throughout the Year

A simple birthday party can be easy to budget for, but a birthday bash where all your child’s friends are invited is another story. It is also not really acceptable to ask other parents for help unless you’re friends with them. You don’t know what their financial situation is like, and if they themselves have never asked for money, it is a downright faux pas.

Instead, to make these birthdays more affordable, just put away a small amount of money every month. This can go towards their birthday party and birthday present, and if there is anything left over, just save it for next year.

Have Your Kid Do the Same

If your kid has a ‘job,’ perhaps doing the paper delivery round, or does chores around your house to learn the value of work, then get them on board with the planning and budgeting for their birthday party. This doesn’t mean they pay for it themselves, but you can give them an amount they need to save up to make the party happen. It will teach them many valuable skills, including the value of money, responsibility, and how to save for what they want.

Research Together for a Great Activity

Knowing how to research and having the patience to go through all your options properly is a great skill that will serve your kids well in school and in life. To help encourage them to plan ahead for their birthday party, don’t do any of it for them. Instead, around a month or two before their birthday, sit down together to brainstorm.

First, you’ll want to narrow down exactly what your kid wants out of their birthday. Then it’s time to branch out to see what is available. If they want an adventure, then you have theme parks like Urban Air Adventure Park in Ft Worth, TX, which offers excellent activities like trampolines, rock climbing walls, obstacle courses, and more.

Don’t Be Afraid to Take Things Away

Some things are, unfortunately, just going to be too expensive, and that is okay. Instead of just taking something out, however, work with your kid to decide on what needs to be taken away. There might be some tears and some crying, but this is an important life lesson, and it will help them prioritize what they actually want.

How to Help Them Learn to be a Great Host

When planning a birthday party with your kid, continue to remind them to think of their guests and what they will like. This will help your kid be courteous, a great host, and help develop their empathy.