Grumman Aerospace Corporation

University of California

Northrop Grumman Systems Corporation

Richard J Gran

Michael Proise

Leon Kaufman

Joseph W Carlson

Dennis W Berde

Lim H Cheung

Hugo D Ritucci

An active vibration damping arrangement which is adapted to improve passenger ride comfort in various types and categories of transport vehicles; especially such as, but not limited to railroads, buses, automotive devices, maglev (magnetic levitation) vehicles, trains and people mover devices in general. In essence, pursuant to specific physical applications and uses, the active motion and vibration damping arrangement is intended to provide a suitable supplemental damping system installed in addition to currently employed so-called passive vibration dampers which are widely employed in connection with such vehicles, transportation devices, vibration-susceptive machinery and the like. The active motion and vibration damping arrangement includes a pair of actuators which; for example, may be constituted from hydraulic cylinder piston units or the like, each of which has respectively one end thereof connected, for instance, to a railroad car body, and the opposite end to the compartment floor of a passenger compartment which is subjected to vibrations and/or swaying and heaving motions encountered by the car body transmitted thereto due to varying road bed or rail conditions or irregularities transmitted through the wheel, truck, car body and, in essence, the normally installed passive vibration damping arrangement, towards the compartment floor.

Active vibration damping arrangement for transportation vehicles

An infra-red sensor system for all weather, day and night traffic surveillance of ground based vehicles. The infra-red sensor system comprises system comprises an infra-red, focal plane array detector, signal processors, a communications interface and a central computer. The infra-red, focal plane array detector senses the heat emitted from vehicles passing within the field of view. Information collected from the array detector is input to signal processors which are programmed with tracking algorithms and other application specific algorithms to extract and calculate meaningful traffic data from the infra-red image captured by the array detector. The meaningful data includes the location, speed and acceleration of all vehicles passing within the field of view of the array detector. The information from the signal processors is transmitted to the central computer via the communications interface for further processing and dissemination of information.

Infra-red sensor system for intelligent vehicle highway systems

Electromagnet coil driving circuitry in a magnetic resonance imaging system is modified to include a flux-driven closed-loop real-time feedback control. The result is more accurate and efficient control of the net actual gradient flux generated by the coil even in the presence of magnetic circuit materials exhibiting hysteresis effects and/or electrical conductors giving rise to eddy current effects. Such driver control can be used to simultaneously correct the magnetic flux changes induced by environmental, ambient or other outside disturbances affecting the net magnetic field within a patient imaging volume of a magnetic resonance imaging system.

Gradient driver control in magnetic resonance imaging

Movable aerodynamic control surfaces are mounted to a MAGLEV vehicle. They operate in combination with magnetically actuated coils that are located in the vehicle and cooperate with coils or metallic sheets located along the vehicle guideway. Sensors provide clearance information concerning the vehicle relative to the guideway as well as translational speed and vehicle rotational measurements. Based on input from these sensors, a computer positions the control surfaces and energizes the magnetic coils so as to unload dynamic forces and stresses imposed by the vehicle while providing smoother vehicle movement indicative of superior passenger comfort.

Aeromagnetic control of maglev vehicles with turntable mounted hinged

A two-dimensional fast Fourier transform converter utilizes parallel digital fast Fourier transform processors and a frame serial processing path to convert two-dimensional images of large pixel count (512.times.512 or higher) and high dynamic range (16 bits of pixel intensity quantization) at a rate equal to or exceeding real time processing rate of 30 frames/second. The parallel processors are organized for performing the row and column transformations in a highly parallel and efficient manner. In one embodiment, a uni-directional processing path with segmented image data busses to streamline the data movement is used. In a second embodiment, a bi-directional processing path is utilized such that the fast Fourier transform processors perform row and column conversions sequentially, thus reducing by a factor of two the number of individual fast Fourier transform processors required. The converter includes three port SRAM working memories, toggled DRAM image frame storage memories, and a data transfer and sequence controller.

Growing community of inventors

Farmingdale, NY, United States of America

Richard J Gran