Dear Reader,
 With this November newsletter, most of our American readers will be recovering from their post - Thanksgiving holiday. Though the specific Holiday called Thanksgiving is unique in North America, holiday harvest festivals and celebration with friends and family is pretty universal. Europe, Africa and Asia all have their counterparts ranging from three day celebrations up to eight day rituals steeped in history, full of stories and almost always involving special food preparations. It is a good time of year to reflect on all that we have to be thankful for in our lives. In that spirit, BEI would like to send our thanks to you for your continued business, the opportunity to give support when you need it and the chance to be part of your success. |
| Speaking of Scary |
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Some sensors just seem to be right at home when it comes to working in rough, wet, environmentally challenging places.  Witness the Model HHM3S 1024 count encoder. Don't let its small size fool you. At only 30mm diameter, this mighty marvel of measurement welcomes the onslaught of 200 g shocks and 20 g's vibration. Have you got an IP67 environment? Well, bring it on.
Using magnetic sensing technologies, BEI's HHM3 series packs a lot of performance into a small, lightweight package. With a maximum resolution of 1024, this sensor is just the ticket to adding measurement or control capabilities to your off-road, agricultural or light rail vehicles. Small size, high performance - this is a versatile encoder just waiting to be used in your application. Read more about it by clicking the image. |
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| The Digital Revolution |
Not many people can claim the sort of legacy of our featured profile person for this month. An inventor, scientist, noble prize winner (in two disciplines) she is the only woman interred in the Pantheon in Paris and even has an element named after her.
"All my life through, the new sights of Nature made me rejoice like a child."
"I am one of those who think . . . that humanity will draw more good than evil from new discoveries."
"I was taught that the way of progress was neither swift nor easy."
"We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained."
"Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less."
You may have surmised that Marie Curie, the Polish born scientist is our "remarkable woman". She had a very rich and interesting life from her birth in Poland in 1867 through her death in France in 1934. To read a detailed biography, click on her picture.
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| Can You Solve It? |
This is an issue that we see from time to time. Take a moment to read through this and see if you can figure out where this one went wrong.
We had a customer who was doing his first design for a control system in a hazardous area application. He decided to use an intrinsically safe approach in his design. He ordered up the equipment and assembled it for a bench test (in a non hazardous area). His control system was designed to operate at 24 volts, a common operating voltage. When he powered up his installation, he promptly fried his encoders along with some other bits of equipment. What was going on?
A. Intrinsically safe designs can operate safely in explosive environments by limiting the amount of power into the equipment so that it stays below the lower explosive limit of the hazardous atmosphere. For most control equipment this means that they need to be used in conjunction with "barriers" that protect the equipment in the case of short circuit or overvoltage situations. Our intrepid designer had neglected to install barriers for the encoders (which were only rated for a five volt input) and put a full 24 volts into the units. Once he got the correct barriers installed, the problem went away.
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| Shine On |
Those of you who are particularly adept at wordplay may recognize the title of this section as a palindrome. "What", the rest of you may ask, "is a palindrome?" For the uninitiated, it is a clever arrangement of words or letters that reads exactly the same forwards or backwards. Many people have made a life's work out of constructing the longest, cleverest or most contrived palindromes. Of course the best are the ones that create a clever phrase, like the one in the title above. Take for example, one of my favorites: A man, a plan, a canal: Panama or how about the humorous: Nurse, I spy gypsies. Run! Well, you get the idea.
To see a listing of palindromes, then click this link. And if you want to read about a programmer who built a program to construct the world's longest palindrome, then check it out, here. Perhaps you'll be inspired to construct a few of your own! |
THANK YOU
We appreciate the time you spend with us each month. Our hope is to inform, educate and entertain. Feel free to drop us a line if there is anything we can do for you.
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| Spotlight |
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Feel the power
So you've got your product, cable assemblies, tools, accessory items and installation instructions. You're all ready to go, but wait. You forgot the power supply. No worries - we have one just for you. Click the picture and you can order one, now.
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