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Technical Factors

Emerging Technologies

H1.2 identifies appropriate equipment, production and manufacturing techniques and describes the impact of new and developing technologies in industry.

Source: Stage 6 Syllabus, Industrial Technology, NSW Board of Studies . 2008.

The study of any of the Focus areas in Industrial Technology will involve experience with a range of tools and equipment necessary to assist you to develop skills and produce your Major Project. You will have access to only a limited range of technology within your school or college environment and through Industry visits may have seen various industrial machines and processes in action.
The evolution of manufacturing from the use of simple hand tools in cottage industries, through the introduction of machinery in factories during the Industrial Revolution in the mid to late 1800’s to completely automated, computer controlled processes developed from the mid 1900’s to the present day is well documented in many history books.

Computer Numerically Controlled (CNC) machinery has revolutionised manufacturing by enabling plans and drawings from a design office to be communicated to machines such as machining centres, milling machines, profile cutters or electronic circuit making equipment, etc in an instant, ensuring the processes are carried out accurately, quickly and consistently without human error. This integration of design, drawing and machinery processes is referred to as CAD/CAM or computer aided design/computer aided manufacturing.

In the 20th century CAD/CAM would have been the emerging technology and it is still in a state of evolution as it is being applied to an ever widening range of processes across the timber, metal, building and product development industries.

But what are the manufacturing technologies and applications that are emerging in the 21st century?

Once experimental and in research stages, processes such as:

Laser sintering or stereo lithography
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selective_laser_sintering
http://computer.howstuffworks.com/stereolith.htm
3D laser scanning
http://www.scansite.com/scanning.html
Water/abrasive jet cutting
http://www.waterjets.org/about_abrasivejets.html

are now in widespread use in industry.

Many more technologies are constantly being introduced across a wide range of applications as well as numerous applications that are still in the development stage and will become commonplace in our lifetime.

The information available on the internet alone on emerging technologies is vast and impossible to cover here. However, by learning about some of the most recent developments we can start to appreciate the influences of these technologies on industrial processes, production methods and costs, efficiency, raw material usage, environmental advantages and so on.

Download Word version of Activities

ACTIVITY 1

From the websites given above, describe the process of:

Stereo lithography -
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3D laser scanning -
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1. Water/abrasive cutting -
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2. List some of the advantages of water/abrasive cutting.
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Answer

ACTIVITY 2

Go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blu-ray_Disc and explain the advantages of Blu-ray discs over conventional CD or DVD formats.
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1. From the site http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OLED what does OLED stand for?
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2. List some of the advantages of this technology.
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3. List some of the commercial uses of OLED’s.
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At the following site you will read about ‘stretchable silicon’ http://www.technologyreview.com/read_article.aspx?ch=specialsections&sc=emergingtech&id=16477
What could be some of the potential uses of this development in circuitry?
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Answer

ACTIVITY 3

Explain the difference between ‘incremental sheet metal forming’ and conventional methods of shaping sheet metal as outlined at:: http://www.psgtech.edu/psgias/smart_machine_tools/N%20V%20Reddy_bak.pdf ……………………………………………………………………………………………………
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Using a labelled sketch, explain the process of ‘friction stir welding’ which is outlined at:
http://www.new-technologies.org/ECT/Mechanical/fsw.htm
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Answer

Explore the following list of websites that highlight a wide range of ‘emerging technologies’ and discuss with your teacher and class what the implications might be for your Focus Area industry.

http://www.csiro.au/csiro/channel/pch3,,.html

http://www.csiro.au/csiro/channel/pch69.html

http://www.csiro.au/csiro/content/standard/ps1rc,,.html

http://www.technologyreview.com/special/emerging/index.aspx

http://www.technologyreview.com/index.aspx

http://www.gizmag.com.au/

http://www.new-technologies.org/ECT/Civil/kwikkap.htm

http://www.topix.net/business/emerging-tech

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2003-06/ti-ets061203.php

http://www.invetech.com.au/index.php?pageId=1583