There are a variety of methods used to decorate plastic products, with one of the most popular processes being dye sublimation. While most people associate dye sublimation paper with textiles and apparel, this is not solely the case, as this process also can be used to decorate a broad array of plastic or rigid substrates.
What is dye sublimation? Sublimation is defined as “a phase transition of a substance from a solid state to a gas while bypassing the intermediate liquid phase.” In the case of dye sublimation printing onto rigid substrates, the disperse dye inks are printed onto a coated medium, which is most often a “transfer paper,” but also can be a “transfer film.” Once printed, these water-insoluble dyes then dry and turn solid as the water solution evaporates. Heat (typically 400°F), pressure and time turn these solid dyes into gas which, upon release from the transfer paper or film, then penetrates the plastic or polyester coating. In addition to dyeing the plastic or rigid substrate, the sticky sublimation paper transforms the dull colors that were originally printed on the transfer paper into incredibly vibrant hues.
The end-product and volume will determine the type of heat press that should be purchased. If decorating mainly flat objects, then a flatbed press is ideal. Flatbed presses can be small (16×20″) presses or large-format presses that can accommodate 4×8′ panels.
If sublimating on 3D objects, then a 3D oven press will be needed. Once again, the oven presses can range from smaller “desktop” units to machines the size of a walk-in room. Instead of printing onto transfer paper, the images will be printed onto transfer film, which is able to conform around the edges of the object being decorated. A fixture is needed to hold both the object and printed film in place. A vacuum hose is attached so the printed film thermoforms around the object and, when the oven heats up to 400°F, the Inkjet Sublimation Paper process takes place.
With dye sublimation, the applications are seemingly endless. The important thing for users to remember is that dye-sublimation takes place at the heat press, not at the printer. However, a high-quality printer with premium RIP software is necessary to produce quality prints with accurate colors and ink drop placement. Dye sublimation ink droplets are extremely small. A colleague best described it by saying, “the largest dye-sublimation ink droplet is smaller than the smallest eco-solvent ink droplet.” What that basically means is that these ink droplets are small, and they need proper control when they jet from the piezo print head. Without proper control, it is not possible to achieve fine lines and details or smooth gradients.
Dye heat sublimation paper requires polyester or plastic for the inks to penetrate into the substrate and dye. The blanks must be able to withstand 400°F heat, pressure and time (which can range from 60 seconds to minutes, depending on size and type of object).
How does UV printing differ from other printing methods?
Ultraviolet (UV) printing is different from tacky sublimation paper or conventional printing methods – including both traditional pigment, solvent inkjet and commercial offset – in many ways. While it is still ink on “paper,” the ink cures through a completely different process and the “paper” ends up being no longer just paper. Instead of having solvents in the ink that evaporate into the air and absorb into the paper, UV inks dry through photoinitiators in the ink and are solidified by UV lamps. When the inks are exposed to ultraviolet energy, they turn from a liquid or paste into a solid. Thus, UV-curable inks are “cured” once they are exposed to the wavelengths of UV energy.

Dyne level or surface tension in UV printing is the property of a UV ink forming unbalanced molecular forces at or near the surface. If this is higher than the surface energy of a material, the liquid tends to form droplets rather than spread out. Plastic materials can have very different surface energies based on their composition and how they are formed. The surface tension is normally measured in energy units called dynes/cm.
If the ink has a dyne level lower than the material’s surface energy, then the ink will spread out over its entire surface in a uniform, wet layer. If the ink’s dyne level is equal to or higher than a material’s dyne level, the ink becomes cohesive and tends to remain in droplets, thus allowing for better adhesion to plastics.

Aluminum building materials is widely used in building because of its intrinsic properties of lightness and corrosion resistance.
Aluminum is used in external facades, roofs and walls, in windows and doors, in staircases, railings, shelves, and other several applications.
Aluminium in building construction

This paper contains complete overview of use of Aluminum corbel in building construction. How it is beneficial in modern age building construction. This paper also contains the properties, advantages. Some question arises that whether aluminium is sustainable, fabricated for fast track, requires maintenance, are explained in detail in this paper.
While Aluminum railing has a relatively high co-efficient of linear expansion, at 24 X 10-6/’C – in its pure form, the material’s low modulus of elasticity (65,500N/mm2 for 6063 alloy) enables temperature induced stresses to be accommodated. Indeed, these are generally far lower than in a comparable steel structure (M of E = 210,000N/mm2). This is graphically illustrated by Aluminium’s load-deflection curve, which is continuous, without a yield point.
Aluminium sections are generally thinner an
Although basic material costs will always be important to specifiers, they should be balanced against the cost of fabrication and subsequent service performance. This is an area where Aluminium, being ideally suited to highly automate manufacturing procedures to exact tolerances, offers many benefits. Aluminium door extrusions, for instance, are subjected to a rigorous quality regime, from hardness testing of the raw extrusion to conical bends, sawing, scratching, gouging, hammering and weight drops to guarantee coating performance. It is this combination of quality control, excellent cost in use and systems technology that has helped develop new markets for Aluminium roof companies in the health, education, leisure and transport sectors where changes in the funding of building procurement, such as PFI and fund-holding schools has changed the emphasis from lowest capital cost to lowest cost in use. Specifiers are increasingly looking for effective systems solutions by involving system suppliers early in the design process to ensure the most elegantly engineered solution at the lowest cost.

You may not appreciate the importance of window dressings — which, in addition to looks, provide privacy and block light — until you move into a place with naked windows. Luckily, adding curtains is one of the easier — and less expensive — projects you can undertake to transform a room. To help you dress your windows with the least amount of headache, we turned to 10 interior designers for their favorite curtains, lots of which are surprisingly quite budget friendly. (If you’re shopping for curtains, you’re likely looking at rods, and this list has a bunch of expert-recommended options to choose from.)
Before we get to the blackout curtain— which include a range of ready-made styles in different opacities, colors, and patterns, as well as a couple of custom options — some quick guidelines for how to size the drapery you choose for your space. When it comes to measuring your windows, Megan Hersch, the owner of Studio MG Interiors and online interior-design service RoomLift, says you should measure 12 to 24 inches beyond the window on either side to determine how wide each curtain panel should be, so that you have some gather. In determining the length of your curtain, Hersch says it depends on how formal you want them to look — and how much cleaning you want to do. “I typically measure the drapery so that it just ‘kisses’ the floor,” she says. “This way, nothing is dragging and trapping dirt, but you are sure they don’t look too short.” For a more formal look, she suggests adding an extra 1.5 inches so the drape just “breaks” on the floor. The most dramatic look is to have the panels “puddle” on the floor, which means adding anywhere from 8 to 12 inches to the length of the curtain (the type of fabric, whether stiff like taffeta or soft like velvet, will also determine how naturally it gathers on the floor).
A sheer curtain is a great choice if you want a little bit of everything from your window treatments — privacy, light, and looks — without having to commit too heavily to any one of those needs. As Megan Huffman, a designer with the online interior-design service Modsy, puts it, sheer curtains “provide the ability to allow natural light into a space and 

are “a super-functional” detail that negates the need to buy curtain rings, and makes opening and closing them easy.
For faux linen blackout curtain, these are Mulhearn’s go-tos. She likes that they’re affordable, come in a variety of neutral colors, and are available in various lengths, from 63 inches to 108 inches. They also have a grommet top, which means you don’t need to get additional curtain rings to hang them from a rod.Take note of the word parted. Beyond the myriad practical aspects, window treatments, from simple to elaborate, offer us moments of communion, as human hands—whether your own or those of Lady Dudley’s housekeeper—adjust them at will. There are aural pleasures too, from the clicking of curtain rings to the swish of fabric to the creak of shutters to the whir of roller blinds. Literally, the beauty of geometric blackout curtain is an open-and-shut case.

THE INSTITUTEThis month The Institute is focusing on how technology is transforming the garment industry. The electronic Jacquard loom was the first loom that automatically created complex textile patterns. This led to the mass production of cloth with intricate designs.

What do printers do? Well, they make paper copies of what's on your screen. But contrary to what you may think, modern LaserJet toner cartridges don't print using ink. So then how do LaserJet toner cartridges work?

Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens both being capable. The earlier hominid ability to emit sounds of variable pitch with some meaning shows that music at its simplest level must have predated speech. The possibilities of anthropoid motor impulse suggest that rhythm may have preceded melody, though full control of rhythm may well not have come any earlier than the perception of music above. There are four evident purposes for music: dance, ritual, entertainment personal, and communal, and above all social cohesion, again on both personal and communal levels. We then proceed to how outdoor musical instrument began, with a brief survey of the surviving examples from the Mousterian period onward, including the possible Neanderthal evidence and the extent to which they showed “artistic” potential in other fields. We warn that our performance on replicas of surviving instruments may bear little or no resemblance to that of the original players. We continue with how later instruments, strings, and skin-drums began and developed into instruments we know in worldwide cultures today. The sound of music is then discussed, scales and intervals, and the lack of any consistency of consonant tonality around the world. This is followed by iconographic evidence of the instruments of later antiquity into the European Middle Ages, and finally, the history of public performance, again from the possibilities of early humanity into more modern times. This paper draws the ethnomusicological perspective on the entire development of music, instruments, and performance, from the times of H. neanderthalensis and H. sapiens into those of modern musical history, and it is written with the deliberate intention of informing readers who are without special education in music, and providing necessary information for inquiries into the origin of music by cognitive scientists.

The first recorded mention of velvet fabric is from the 14th century, and scholars of the past mostly believed that this textile was originally produced in East Asia before making its way down the Silk Road into Europe. Traditional forms of velvet were made with pure silk, which made them incredibly popular. Asian silk was already very soft, but the unique production processes used to make velvet result in a material that’s even more sumptuous and luxurious than other silk products.
Until velvet gained popularity in Europe during the Renaissance, this fabric was commonly used in the Middle East. The records of many civilizations located within the borders of in modern Iraq and Iran, for instance, indicate that velvet was a favorite fabric among the royalty the region.
When machine looms were invented, velvet production became much less expensive, and the development of synthetic fabrics that somewhat approximate the properties of silk finally brought the wonders of velvet to even the lowest rungs of society. While today’s velvet may not be as pure or exotic as the velvet of the past, it remains prized as a material for curtains, blankets, stuffed animals, and all manner of other products that are supposed to be as soft and cuddly as possible.
While various materials can be used to make velvet, the process used to produce this burnout velvet fabric is the same regardless of which base textile is used. Velvet can only be woven on a unique type of loom that spins two layers of fabric simultaneously. These fabric layers are then separated, and they are wound up on rolls.

Silk is the closest thing we have to an ideal fabric from an environmental standpoint. This embossed velvet fabric is still, in most cases, produced the same way it has been produced for thousands of years, and since the production of silk is not aided by any pesticides, fertilizers, or other toxic substances, making this fabric does not have any significant negative environmental impact.
Velvet fabric is popular for evening wear and dresses for special occasions, as the jaguar velvet fabric was initially made from silk. Cotton, linen, wool, mohair, and synthetic fibers can also be used to make velvet, making velvet less expensive and incorporated into daily-wear clothes. Velvet is also a fixture of home decor, where it’s used as upholstery fabric, curtains, pillows, and more.
Velvet today is usually made from synthetic and natural fibers, but it was originally made from silk. Pure silk velvet is rare today, as it’s extremely expensive. Most velvet that is marketed as silk velvet combines both silk and rayon. Synthetic velvet can be made from polyester, nylon, viscose, or rayon.
There are several different Holland velvet fabric types, as the fabric can be woven from a variety of different materials using a variety of methods.

The presented paper provides a modelling strategy for roll forming of a high strength aluminum alloy tube. Roll forming allows the cost-effective production of large quantities of long profiles. Forming of high strength aluminum brings challenges like high springback and poor formability due to the low Young’s modulus, low ductility and high yield strength. Forming processes with high strength aluminum, such as the AA7075 alloy, therefore require a detailed process design. Three different forming strategies, one double radius strategy and two W-forming strategies are discussed in the paper. The paper addresses the question whether common roll forming strategies are appropriate for the challenge of roll forming of a high strength aluminum micro channel tube. For this purpose, different forming strategies are investigated numerically regarding buckling, longitudinal strain distribution and final geometry. While geometry is quite the same for all strategies, buckling and strain distribution differ with every strategy. The result of the numerical investigation is an open tube that can be welded into a closed tube in a subsequent step. Finally, roll forming experiments are conducted and compared with the numerical results.Current research in production technology focuses primarily on increasing resource efficiency and thus follows the approach of fundamental sustainability of processes and products. High strength aluminum alloys (e.g. AA7075) are commonly used in aerospace applications in spite of their high cost of about 5 €/kg and poor formability [1]. Due to ambitious legal requirements, such as the CO2 target in automotive engineering, new lightweight construction concepts are still needed [2]. An excellent basis is offered by the production of high strength AA7075 thin walled tubes as semi-finished products by roll forming. These can be further processed in subsequent customized processes such as welding, stamping, cutting or rotary swaging.

lead to large elongation of the band edge and thus to buckling. For circular sections (e.g. tube), the BLS is 5–10 times higher than the BLS for a U-profile [6].Groche et al. [11], Park et al. [7], Zou et al. [12] and Lee et al. [13] showed that roll forming of high strength materials and especially of high strength aluminum drawn tube brings challenges compared to commonly roll formed steel grades. High strength leads to high springback and thus to less dimensional accuracy in the processed part. Parameters, which have an influence on springback are shown in Table 1. Difficulties regarding aluminum include early fracture due to low ductility, higher springback and redundant deformation. This requires a well-designed forming strategy in order to get the lowest possible springback and buckling in the roll forming process and the best quality of the processed part. In contrast, aluminum shows a good-natured behavior with regard to buckling due to a higher value of BLS compared to steel [14].The single radius-forming strategy has the advantage to form tubes with different sheet thickness on the same tool. A flower pattern with constant bending radius over the entire cross-section of the sheet is characteristic for the single radius-forming. For high-strength materials, the single radius-forming strategy is not applicable due to high springback caused by the high elastic bending content [10, 18].
 uniform increments and to keep the longitudinal strain low in the band edge. The further approach is to calculate the stresses of the formed tube to arrive at the number of passes required. Forming strategy 2R is the first strategy numerically investigated by the FE-software Marc Mentat.In this paper, roll forming of a high strength extruded aluminum tube is investigated. Due to the difficult determination of the design parameters, roll forming of high strength aluminum is a challenge. Conventional roll forming strategies quickly reach their limits when forming aluminum or high strength steels. To form a tube out of high-strength aluminum alloys such as AA7075, a W-forming strategy is recommended. Another positive influence is the application of a down-hill strategy. The investigations have shown that an efficient roll forming production line for high strength aluminum tubes can be set up even with a small number Axial crash of thin-walled circular seamless aluminum tube is investigated in this study. These kinds of tubes usually are used in automobile and train structures to absorb the impact energy. An explicit finite element method (FEM) is used to model and analyse the behaviour. Formulation of the energy absorption and the mean crash force in the range of variables is presented using design of experiments (DOE) and response surface method (RSM). Comparison with experimental tests has been accomplished in some results for validation. Also, comparison with the analytical aspect of this problem has been done. Mean crash force has been considered as a constraint as its value is directly related to the crash severity and occupant injury. The results show that the triggering causes a decrease in the maximum force level during crash.

The design, operation and use are characterized for high voltage vacuum contactors in underground coal mines endangered by methane and coal dust explosions. Design of a vacuum contactor is shown in a scheme. Vacuum contactors are superior to electromagnetic contactors. Vacuum contactors have a reduced size and weight and are characterized by improved commutation properties. Under vacuum conditions, intensity of electric discharges is lower than in an electromagnetic contactor. Reliability of vacuum contactors is 16 to 20 times higher than that of electromagnetic contactors (90% of metal vapors caused by an electric arc settle on contact surface). No time consuming buildup removal or cleaning is necessary. Optimizing contactor position in a power system in underground mines is discussed. Efficiency of using vacuum contactors and the RC systems is discussed.

Flight cases, carrying cases or equipment cases are sturdy, rigid trunks or enclosures designed for protecting personal goods in transit and storage. They’re typically made from plastic or metal. Many models feature a range of additional options, like heavy-duty foam inserts or additional protective padding.