Abstract: An electrically powered garden tool includes an electric motor mounted upright within an outer shell housing, a pair of relatively reciprocating shear blades assembled to be driven by operation of the motor through a crank mechanism provided within a lower portion of the outer shell housing, and a cooling fan assembled to be driven by operation of the motor for introducing outside air into an upper portion of the outer shell housing to exhaust the introduced air from a lower portion of the outer shell housing. In the garden tool, a downward exhaust opening is formed within a lower end peripheral wall of the outer shell housing enclosing the crank mechanism such that the air spouted by rotation of the cooling fan blows out downward from the downward exhaust opening to restrain the occurrence of blowing noise of the air.

Abstract: An energy storage circuit includes a first capacitor connected with a power generating element via a first diode and a second capacitor connected with the power generating element via a second diode and a switch. The conduction state of the switch is controlled using the potential difference between its second and third electrodes (driving voltage V). The driving voltage when the switch enters its conductive state is higher than the driving voltage when the switch enters its non-conductive state.

Abstract: An angular rate sensor and an acceleration sensor are sealed at the same sealing pressure. The sealing pressure at this time is put into a reduced pressure state below the atmospheric pressure in view of improving a detection sensitivity of the angular rate sensor. Even in the reduced pressure atmosphere, to improve the detection sensitivity of the acceleration sensor, a shift suppressing portion (damper) for suppressing shifts of a movable body of the acceleration sensor is provided. This shift suppressing portion includes a plurality of protruding portions integrally formed with the movable body and a plurality of protruding portions integrally formed with a peripheral portion, and the protruding portions are alternately disposed separately at equal intervals.

Abstract: A noise reduction device for a blower includes a noise reduction member. The noise reduction member has a noise reduction chamber and a noise reduction opening defined therein, so that a part of air flowing into, through or out of the blower can enter the noise reduction chamber via the noise reduction opening.

Abstract: Tire comprising a tread having a tread surface (11) and comprising a plurality of grooves (2) of generally circumferential orientation and of depth H, these grooves (2) defining a plurality of rubber elements (3, 30), at least one of which comprises a plurality of cavities (6), each cavity (6) of volume Vc of generally elongate shape with a total length Lc and being designed to communicate with a single groove (2) of generally circumferential orientation, each cavity (6) being extended all the way along its length Lc by an incision (80) which extends radially outwardly to emerge at the tread surface (11), this tire being such that the incision (80) comprises an incision portion (81) beginning at the cavity and forming an angle A of at least 10° with a line perpendicular to the tread surface and passing through the point of intersection of the incision with the cavity (6).

Abstract: An image pickup device disposed in a predetermined position relative to a surface of a strained silicon wafer photographs the surface of the strained silicon wafer in a plurality of rotation angle positions on photographing conditions under which bright lines appearing on the surface of the strained silicon wafer can be photographed, in an environment where a light source device illuminates the surface of the strained silicon wafer which is rotating. A composite image in a predetermined angle position is generated from surface images of the strained silicon wafer in a plurality of rotation angle positions obtained by the image pickup device.

Abstract: An angular rate sensor and an acceleration sensor are sealed at the same sealing pressure. The sealing pressure at this time is put into a reduced pressure state below the atmospheric pressure in view of improving a detection sensitivity of the angular rate sensor. Even in the reduced pressure atmosphere, to improve the detection sensitivity of the acceleration sensor, a shift suppressing portion (damper) for suppressing shifts of a movable body of the acceleration sensor is provided. This shift suppressing portion includes a plurality of protruding portions integrally formed with the movable body and a plurality of protruding portions integrally formed with a peripheral portion, and the protruding portions are alternately disposed separately at equal intervals.

Abstract: An image pickup device disposed in a predetermined position relative to a surface of a strained silicon wafer photographs the surface of the strained silicon wafer in a plurality of rotation angle positions on photographing conditions under which bright lines appearing on the surface of the strained silicon wafer can be photographed, in an environment where a light source device illuminates the surface of the strained silicon wafer which is rotating. A composite image in a predetermined angle position is generated from surface images of the strained silicon wafer in a plurality of rotation angle positions obtained by the image pickup device.

Abstract: An optical circuit device makes lightwaves respectively having different wavelengths fall on a filter at different incident angles, respectively. The optical circuit device includes a filter, a mirror and a planar lightwave circuit provided with grooves holding the filter and the mirror therein, and an optical waveguide. The optical waveguide has a receiving part that guides a lightwave to the filter, a multipath reflection part in which the lightwave is reflected repeatedly, and an emitting part that guides lightwaves transmitted by the filter to an emitting end surface. The lightwave falls on the filter at least at two incident angles. The multipath reflection part is provided with a bend waveguide. The filter and the mirror are disposed substantially parallel to each other.

Abstract: An optical circuit device makes lightwaves respectively having different wavelengths fall on a filter at different incident angles, respectively. The optical circuit device includes a filter, a mirror and a planar lightwave circuit provided with grooves holding the filter and the mirror therein, and an optical waveguide. The optical waveguide has a receiving part that guides a lightwave to the filter, a multipath reflection part in which the lightwave is reflected repeatedly, and an emitting part that guides lightwaves transmitted by the filter to an emitting end surface. The lightwave falls on the filter at least at two incident angles. The multipath reflection part is provided with a bend waveguide. The filter and the mirror are disposed substantially parallel to each other.

Abstract: The following are disclosed: An optical wave-guide constituted out of polymers, an optical integrated circuit, an optical module, and an optical communication system (optical communication apparatus) using these. In the polymer optical waveguide which is fabricated on a substrate having an inorganic material on at least a part of the surface thereof and in which a core layer and a clad layer positioned closer to the base than the core layer are composed of polymers, a buffer layer, which is composed of a polymer different from that of the clad layer, is provided between the clad layer and the base.

Abstract: An optical switch has an input optical waveguide and an output optical waveguide that are physically and optically separated from each other by a two-level crossing arrangement. The direction of optical signal propagation is switchable by a connecting optical waveguide to provide optical coupling between the input and output optical waveguides. Crosstalk and loss due to diffraction at each crossing are small, and insertion loss does not increase, even for a large-scale application.

Abstract: To obtain an optical functional device such that the reflectivity of a facet and the loss of coupling with a fiber are reduced, a mode conversion region for changing the beam spot size is formed on the input facet and/or the output facet in an optical function region and the facet of the side to be connected with a fiber in the mode conversion region is formed obliquely to the direction of propagation of light.

Abstract: Ferromagnetic granular ultrafine particles consisting essentially of .epsilon.' iron carbide represented by the composition formula:.epsilon.'-Fe.sub.2.2 Chaving an average particle size of about 0.01 to 0.2 .mu.m, and ferromagnetic acicular ultrafine particles consisting essentially of .epsilon.' iron carbide represented by the composition formula:.epsilon.'-Fe.sub.2.2 Chaving a major axis of about 0.05 to 0.5 .mu.m, a minor axis of about 0.01 to 0.06 and an axial ratio of 4 to 20, which have good coercive force and a small magnetic domain.

Abstract: This invention involves a MIG welding method for aluminum alloys to prevent the formation and deposition of black powder on or around the weldment's bead. By using pure aluminum wire or aluminum alloy wire containing less than 2.5 wt% the base of alloying components as the consumable electrode wire and using aluminum alloy wire as the filler wire 3, the consumable electrode wire 2 and the filler wire 3 are fed into the a metal bath under a certain weight ratio, so that the alloy composition of the molten metal bath is equivalent to that of the base of the black powder on the both sides of the weldment's bead can be is avoided.

Abstract: The present invention relates to feeding liquid oxygen from the main condenser of the upper rectifying column of an air liquefying/separating unit into a xenon condensing column. The liquid oxygen is evaporated in varying amounts in correspondence to fluctuating amounts of liquid oxygen being fed into the xenon condensing column. The level and pressure of the liquid at the xenon condensing column is controlled and quantities of liquid oxygen is vented from the xenon condensing column at a constant level. The vented liquid oxygen is exchanged to high pressure oxygen gas in order to evaporate it, and this evaporated gaseous oxygen is supplied to a xenon absorptive column, and recovered as liquid oxygen through heat-exchangers.

Abstract: A method of consumable electrode arc welding is shown wherein the leading consumable electrode wire is mounted in parallel with a trailing filler wire, the latter inserted into a molten metal bath. Welding current is divided between the consumable electrode wire and the filler wire. These modifications improve the wettable boundary of the molten metal bath, prevent defects in the weld, and provide a high speed, highly efficient and high quality method of welding carbon steels, alloy steels, as well as aluminum and its alloys in a fully automatic as well as a semiautomatic operation. In an apparatus utilizing the above method, a single torch contains the consumable electrode and filler wire. One or more insulating contact tubes containing filler wire are mounted in a gas shield in parallel with a conductive contact tube containing consumable electrode wire. The unit is small in size and light-weight, and thus convenient for a welder to carry or hold during operation.

Abstract: The present invention relates to a process for producing high purity xenon safely at a high yield from liquid oxygen in a main condenser of an air separating unit.The present invention involves a process for concentrating and recovering xenon by gasifying and introducing liquid oxygen led out from the main condenser in the air separating unit into an adsorption column field with an adsorbent which adsorbs xenon for adsorption and desorption, and a process for rectifying and recovering xenon by introducing concentrated xenon gas into a solid-gas separating column, which is cooled to a temperature at which xenon is solidified but components other than xenon such as oxygen and krypton in the concentrated xenon gas are not solidified to, catch xenon by condensation, then heating the solid-gas separating column after evacuating gas components remained therein.

Abstract: This invention provides a manufacturing process which produces highly purified Xenon economically and safely with high recovery efficiency. In this invention liquid oxygen containing Xenon, which is vented from the main condenser in the upper rectification column of the air separating unit, is sequentially fed into multiple adsorptive columns filled with an adsorbent to selectively adsorb the Xenon. By a sequence of adsorbing-desorbing steps, Xenon is gradually condensed and, at the final state, highly purified Xenon is recovered. Hydrocarbons (CmHn) are removed from the product gas by a catalytic process. Xenon at a purity as high as 99.995% and at a yield as high as 95% is obtained by use of the present process.