Ejection Forces and Friction Coefficients from Injection Molding Experiments Using Rapid Tooling Inserts

Experiments have been performed with injection mold inserts made using solid freeform fabrication processes in an effort to further study such applications for economic production of small quantities of parts. Static friction coefficients were determined for HDPE and HIPS against P-20 steel, sintered LaserForm ST-100, and stereolithography SL 5170 using the ASTM D 1894 standard. Injection mold inserts were constructed of the same three materials and were used to inject cylindrical parts using HDPE and HIPS. Ejection forces were measured, and a model was used to calculate ejection forces and apparent coefficients of static friction. Statistical analyses were used to determine the effects of packing time, cooling time and packing pressure on ejection force for the three insert types. This paper compares experimental and calculated ejection forces, compares standard friction test results to calculated apparent coefficients of friction, summarizes the statistical results, and comments on the feasibility of using rapid tooled inserts for injection molding.Mechanical Engineerin

Clementine Observations of the Zodiacal Light and the Dust Content of the Inner Solar System

Using the Moon to occult the Sun, the Clementine spacecraft used its navigation cameras to map the inner zodiacal light at optical wavelengths over elongations of 3-30 degrees from the Sun. This surface brightness map is then used to infer the spatial distribution of interplanetary dust over heliocentric distances of about 10 solar radii to the orbit of Venus. We also apply a simple model that attributes the zodiacal light as being due to three dust populations having distinct inclination distributions, namely, dust from asteroids and Jupiter-family comets (JFCs), dust from Halley-type comets, and an isotropic cloud of dust from Oort Cloud comets. The best-fitting scenario indicates that asteroids + JFCs are the source of about 45% of the optical dust cross-section seen in the ecliptic at 1 AU, but that at least 89% of the dust cross-section enclosed by a 1 AU radius sphere is of a cometary origin. When these results are extrapolated out to the asteroid belt, we find an upper limit on the mass of the light-reflecting asteroidal dust that is equivalent to a 12 km asteroid, and a similar extrapolation of the isotropic dust cloud out to Oort Cloud distances yields a mass equivalent to a 30 km comet, although the latter mass is uncertain by orders of magnitude.Comment: To be published in Icaru

Observation of narrow-band noise accompanying the breakdown of insulating states in high Landau levels

Recent magnetotransport experiments on high mobility two-dimensional electron systems have revealed many-body electron states unique to high Landau levels. Among these are re-entrant integer quantum Hall states which undergo sharp transitions to conduction above some threshold field. Here we report that these transitions are often accompanied by narrow- and broad-band noise with frequencies which are strongly dependent on the magnitude of the applied dc current.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Derivative relation for thermopower in the quantum Hall regime

Recently, Tieke et al (to be published in PRL) have observed the relation S_{yx} = alpha B dS_{xx}/dB for the components of the thermopower tensor in the quantum Hall regime, where alpha is a constant and B is the magnetic field. Simon and Halperin (PRL 73, 3278 (1994)) have suggested that an analogous relation observed for the resistivity tensor R_{xx} = \alpha B dR_{xy}/dB can be explained with a model of classical transport in an inhomogeneous medium where the local Hall resistivity is a function of position and the local dissipative resistivity is a small constant. In the present paper, we show that this new thermopower relation can be explained with a similar model.Comment: This paper supercedes cond-mat/9705001 which was withdrawn. 4 pages, Revte