Westinghouse Electric Corporation

Mark S Stoutamire

George D Bucher

Daniel P Soroka

John T DiGrande

Lester C Frye

Philip N Hulsizer

Terrell Wiggins

Pre-stressed insulated concrete panels are disclosed. Methods of making and using pre-stressed insulated concrete panels are also disclosed.

Pre-stressed insulated concrete panels and methods for making and using the same

A gripper mechanism for sampling nuclear fuel pellets at a predetermined depth in a stack of pellets includes a housing and gripping fingers movably mounted to the housing. The fingers are preferably three relatively thin, arcuate-shaped, blade-like fingers angularly displaced from one another for grasping the pellet at spaced locations about its circumference. The fingers have lower facing surfaces which are brought adjacent to one another for engaging and grasping a pellet when the fingers are moved toward their closed position and retracted remote from one another for disengaging and releasing the pellet when the fingers are moved toward their opened position. Guide members interconnecting the housing with a movable support structure, together with coil springs received about the guide members and extending between the housing and support structure, resiliently and yieldably mount the housing and fingers for movement toward the stack of pellets along a generally linear path ahead of the support structure as the support structure is moved toward the stack. Concurrently the yieldable mounting permits the housing to rock slightly about an axis extending transverse to the linear path for facilitating a burrowing-type movement of the gripping fingers into the stack of pellets to be sampled. Also, a proximity switch detects when the fingers are closed and a load transducer senses when an overload condition has been reached.

Method for sampling nuclear fuel pellets with a robot gripper mechanism

Robot gripper mechanism and method for sampling nuclear fuel pellets

A two-axis wrist module includes a roll part 14 rotatable about a first axis A--A driven by shaft 38 coupled through harmonic drive unit 42 functioning as a speed reducer and shaft 44, and a bend part 16 carried by the roll part for rotation about the axis B--B and driven by shaft 68 and shaft 72 coupled to the bend part by the second harmonic drive unit functioning as a speed reducer, the entire wrist module being self-contained in that the motor means for obtaining the two-axis movement is provided in the power enclosure 10 of the wrist module and independent of any powering transmitted mechanically to the wrist module.

Self-contained two-axis wrist module

A gantry type orthogonal axes manipulator system including a rack and pinion mechanical drive for the X and Y axis assemblies and a ball screw mechanical drive for the Z axis assembly employs closed loop DC servo electrical drives controlled by the conventional numerical control techniques. A rotary index feature permits horizontal rotation of the Y axis assembly, which supports the Z axis assembly, at the end of travel of the X axis assembly to service work zones on either side of the X axis assembly.

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Bridgeville, PA, United States of America

Mark S Stoutamire