Abstract: A motion and orientation responsive device having a pendulum pivotally mounted between its ends, and means for detecting relative displacement of the upper pendulum end and a zero position reference on the pendulum support from certain normal relative positions thereof in response to either or both translational and rotational displacements of the device. Presently preferred embodiments of the invention are a seismic or earthquake alarm, an intrusion alarm, and a tilt alarm. In these preferred embodiments, the pendulum shaft is a slender resilient wire, and its pivot is situated close to its lower center of mass in order to amplify the lateral motion of the upper pendulum end for a given angle of pendulum rotation and thereby enhance the sensitivity of the device to low magnitude displacements.

Abstract: A hinge having at least three leaves pivotally joined along edges of the leaves and adapted for attachment to two members to be pivotally connected with at least one member secured to a pair of the leaves which are mutally inclined in such a way that each leaf of the pair resists bending of the other leaf of the pair. A present best mode embodiment of the hinge has four leaves and is designed primarily for use on so-called ultralight airplanes as aileron, rudder, and elevator hinges which are immune to fatigue stress failure. Another hinge embodiment is designed for use as a door hinge and has only three leaves.

Abstract: A parking stand for supporting the tongue of a parked trailer. The parking stand has a coupling ball at its upper end for engagement in the socket of a coupling part on the front end of the trailer tongue and a castor wheel or fixed base at its lower end for supporting the stand on the ground. A clamp on the upper end of the stand acts against the trailer coupling part to secure the stand against swivel movement relative to the trailer tongue.

Abstract: Readily portable apparatus for exterminating animal pests, particularly rodents such as gophers which burrow through the ground. The apparatus includes a small, lightweight internal combustion engine, and means for directing the engine exhaust into exterminating relationship to the pests, such as into a burrow or tunnel of a ground burrowing rodent. The preferred engine is a two-cycle engine which burns a fuel/oil mixture to produce exhaust containing smoke which asphyxiates, carbon monoxide which effectively poisons, and intense pressure pulsations which tend to drive a rodent from an underground tunnel, such that the rodent faces the delema of remaining underground and dying from the effects of the exhaust gas or coming to the surface and exposing himself to death in other ways above ground. In the presently preferred apparatus, the engine is mounted on an inverted bowl-shaped exhaust shroud which seats on the ground to direct the engine exhaust into an underground rodent burrow.

Abstract: A relatively simple, lightweight, low cost brake assembly for relatively light weight vehicles, particularly so-called ultralight airplanes which may be quickly and easily installed on and removed from a vehicle. The brake assembly has a housing to be fixed on a vehicle wheel support, such as an axle, and rotatably mounting a brake rotor having means for compling to a wheel. Operable between the housing and rotor are selectively operable brake means for applying a braking force to the rotor.

Abstract: An improved engine mount for model airplanes which significantly increases usable engine power by reducing engine oscillation and thereby also engine power loss due to such oscillation and which greatly facilitates installation and removal of the engine. The mount comprises a relatively stiff mounting block substantially coaxial with the engine crankshaft rotation axis and extending between and rigidly secured to the rear end of the engine crankcase and an engine mounting wall or the like on the airplane at the rear of the engine. The preferred engine mount has a generally cylindrical spool-like shape with front and rear end flanges containing holes to receive screws for securing the mount to the engine and engine mounting wall.

Abstract: A thermal ice penetration method and apparatus for melting a hole through ice preferably utilizing thermochemical heating by exothermal reaction between water supplied at least in part by the melting ice and a thermochemical reactant, preferably lithium and/or other alkali metal or alkali metal alloy. A number of ice penetration systems and devices are disclosed which utilize the thermal ice penetration to deploy payloads, such as sensors, transducers, antennas, instruments, weapons, or the like, through polar ice either downwardly from the ice surface into the water below the ice or upwardly from the underside of the ice through the ice surface.

Abstract: An analog-to-digital converter quantizer and bidirectional counter using superconducting quantum interference devices (SQUID's) as the principal elements. A double-junction non-latching SQUID is used as a quantizer to produce unipolar output pulses on two different output lines, indicative of positive and negative increments of change in an analog signal current. The unipolar pulses are then counted in a bidirectional counter that employs double-junction non-latching SQUID's as counter stages and as logic gates for the propagation of carry and borrow signals from stage to stage.

Abstract: In an IMPATT diode modulator, a circuit including a free-running oscillator drives the input of a plurality of Schmitt triggers connected in parallel, whose outputs together drive the base of a PNP bipolar transistor connected between positive and negative supply voltages at its collector and emitter through a pulse forming network. The collector voltage of the bipolar transistor drives the gates of a plurality of N-channel V-MOSFET's connected in parallel at their sources and drains between the positive and negative rail voltages.

Abstract: An integrated circuit package has a conductive ring surrounding the integrated circuit substrate and optionally, over the integrated circuit itself, and wires connected between selected chip pads and adjacent portions of the surrounding ring, the surrounding ring being connected to only one of a plurality of external conductive pins of the chip package, the remainder of the external pins being connected to other selected chip pads.

Abstract: Apparatus and a related method for regulating access to a communication bus to which multiple communication nodes are connected. Control logic at each of the nodes determines which of them has priority to access the bus, by means of a parallel arbitration sequence in which all nodes contending for bus access participate. Specifically, each contending node generates a relative priority node number and asserts it onto an arbitration bus. All of the asserted node numbers are logically combined into a composite node number on the bus, and the winning node is determined in a bit-by-bit ripple comparison circuit at each node, the composite node number being compared with the locally generated relative priority node number. Priority is determined in advance of data transmission, and synchronization and arbitration take place without any central or master control unit.

Abstract: A charge-coupled-device analog input circuit, for generating packets of electrical charge representative of samples of a differentiated analog input signal, and a charge-coupled-device analog output circuit, for generating an analog output signal by a process of integration of the signal values represented by the charge packets. The differentiating input circuit includes a signal input circuit with a relatively large input capacitance, and a separate bias input circuit with a relatively small input capacitance, to generate charge packets at a selected bias level. The integrating output circuit includes a set of bias gates for removing from each packet an amount of charge equal to the bias charge generated at the input circuit, and also includes a feedback loop for adding to each charge packet presented at the output circuit a charge equivalent to the cumulative sum of all signal samples derived by the circuit.

Abstract: A packaging technique for radio-frequency circuits, such as feed-forward amplifiers, in which a single ground plane is formed between active components of the circuit and a circuit board bearing passive components of the circuit. The ground plane comprises a metallized face of the circuit board and a metal heat sink attached to each active component. The assembly, including the circuit board, heat sinks and active and passive components, is supported on a ledge in the walls of a metal housing, such that heat is conducted laterally through the ground plane and directly into the walls of the housing. The walls of the housing, including an intermediate wall between active amplifier components, also serve to isolate the active components from each other and from the environment. The plane also serves to isolate the active components from the passive ones.

Abstract: Apparatus, and a related method, for fast carrier acquisition in a modem. The apparatus includes circuitry to speed carrier acquisition by the determination of which of two alternate phasors is being received during a baud synchronization period of a signal preamble before data transmission. Another aspect of the invention involves the use of a complex matched filter for the determination of the start of an equalizer training sequence in the signal preamble. The output of the matched filter exhibits a deep null at the start of the training sequence, since the beginning of the sequence bears an inverse relationship to the end of the preceeding baud synchronization period.

Abstract: An integrated and automated multistation machine is provided for placement and attachment of electrically conductive interconnectors onto solar cells and the like. The machine comprises a rotatable turntable for supporting a plurality of solar cells in respective association with a corresponding plurality of operating stations and then for indexing the solar cells to the next operating stations in sequence. More particularly, the machine includes a cell loading station for transfer of a solar cell from a loading magazine and for precision placement onto one of a plurality of cell-supporting fixtures carried by the turntable. The turntable indexes the solar cells one at a time on the fixtures from the cell loading station first to a flux station whereat a liquid flux material is applied to predetermined points on the cell.

Abstract: An optical fiber severing device comprising a support for retaining a plurality of optical glass fibers in spaced relationship, scoring device for inflicting a flaw on the glass surface of each of the optical fibers providing each of the fibers with first and second portions on opposite sides of its flaw, a pressure mechanism for slidably engaging each of the fibers and applying pressure to a contacted area of each of the fibers, and a motive mechanism for applying respective tension forces between the first portions of the fiber and the pressure means and concurrently moving each of the fibers with respect to the pressure mechanism so that the contacted areas pass over the flaws as they move along the surface of the fibers from the first portions to the second portions.

Abstract: A composite printed circuit board structure including multiple layers of graphite interleaved with layers of a dielectric material, such as a polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) and woven glass laminate. Some of the dielectric layers are copper clad, and at least some of the graphite layers are positioned in close proximity to the copper cladding layers, to provide good heat dissipation properties. The PTFE provides a desirably low dielectric constant and the graphite also provides good mechanical strength and a low or negative coefficient of thermal expansion, to permit matching of the coefficient with that of chip carriers used to mount components on the circuit board.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for combusting solid fuel by introducing a mixture of fuel particles and carrier fluid into a reaction chamber near the center of one end of a combustion chamber and injecting oxidizer gas tangentially into the chamber to establish a swirling flow of gas, fuel particles, and combustion products within a region adjacent the chamber walls. The mass flow rates of oxidizer gas and fuel are regulated to maintain a relatively oxygen-rich stoichiometry within an annular region and a relatively fuel-rich stoichiometry within a central region, and to cause flow of the oxidizer gas and combustion products thru the reaction chamber with throughput residence times of the order of a few hundred milliseconds. This combination of a fuel-rich core portion and a relatively oxygen-rich annular zone effects oxidation of most of the carbon content of the fuel before it reaches the walls and avoids reduction of metal compounds in the fuel, all without overall excess-air combustion.

Abstract: A spacecraft, and related method for its operation, for transporting a payload, such as a satellite, from a space shuttle in a low-altitude parking orbit, to an operational orbit. Housekeeping functions, such as communications, attitude control, and power-supply, are performed by subsystems integrated into the spacecraft and employed both while in the operational orbit and during ascent from the parking orbit. The payload is secured forward of a payload platform having forward and aft faces of isogrid construction, and the housekeeping subsystems are stored between the faces, an interface of electrical and other connections being provided to the payload through the forward platform face. A liquid bipropellant rocket engine secured behind the payload platform provides low thrust and relatively low acceleration, and is operated in a succession of short perigee burns to extend the orbit to a desired altitude, and then in one or more apogee burns to circularize the orbit, if the payload is a satellite.

Abstract: Tool means for severing an optical fiber which comprises first and second members joined together by pivotal connecting means for movement between opened and closed terminal positions. The members each have first portions spaced opposite to each other for providing handle means for moving the members between their opened and closed terminal positions and second portions which are spaced opposite to each other and move closer as the members assume their closed terminal position. The surface of a resilient element carried by the second portion of the first member supports thereon an optical fiber which is to be severed, and a blade means secured with its second portion of the second member has a cutting edge for engaging and inflicting a flaw on the optical fiber when the members are actuated by the handle means to assume their closed terminal position.