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posted by takyon on Wednesday March 13 2019, @07:04PM   Printer-friendly
from the squeeze-pop dept.

Phys.org:

It can be used to cool or heat the air in a room or to cool or heat liquids. And it looks like something that Q—the tech specialist and gadgeteer in the James Bond films—might have come up with. The prototype device, which has been developed by a research team led by Professors Stefan Seelecke and Andreas Schütze at Saarland University, is able to transfer heat using 'muscles' made from nickel-titanium. Nickel-titanium or nitinol, as it is often known, is a shape-memory material that releases heat to its surroundings when it is mechanically loaded in its superelastic state and absorbs heat from its surroundings when it is unloaded. This unusual property is the reason why nitinol is also referred to as a 'smart alloy' or as 'muscle wire." This effect has been exploited by the Saarbrücken researchers who have developed an environmentally friendly heating and cooling system that is two to three times more efficient than conventional heating and cooling devices.

The researchers say the device also works without the usual refrigerants that damage the environment.


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  • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday March 13 2019, @08:33PM (5 children)

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday March 13 2019, @08:33PM (#813910) Journal

    How many times can this nitinol wire bend without breaking?

    (if I knew I wouldn't ask)

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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by c0lo on Wednesday March 13 2019, @09:33PM (4 children)

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday March 13 2019, @09:33PM (#813933) Journal

    Far higher than spring steel. However a bitch to machine, because of the very properties that makes it useful.

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    • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday March 13 2019, @09:43PM (1 child)

      by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday March 13 2019, @09:43PM (#813936) Journal

      I'm going to guess that it cannot be 3D printed.

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      • (Score: 3, Informative) by c0lo on Wednesday March 13 2019, @10:03PM

        by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday March 13 2019, @10:03PM (#813943) Journal

        If you have an e-beam printer with advanced vacuum, you may be able to manufacture [wikipedia.org] the alloy in-place (see the mention of e-beam melting in "boutique" settings). The requirement of homogeneity of the crystal structure for the desired properties may preclude (or make it very time consuming) the localized heating.

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    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by mhajicek on Thursday March 14 2019, @05:09AM (1 child)

      by mhajicek (51) on Thursday March 14 2019, @05:09AM (#814065)

      Actually many steels have a "fatigue limit" of stress, under which the sample does not fatigue and will last indefinitely.

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      • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday March 14 2019, @01:16PM

        by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Thursday March 14 2019, @01:16PM (#814167) Journal

        Pretty much this case too.
        Except that the memory metals (or at least nitinol) work better in a large (mono?) crystal status, with a crystalline structure [wikipedia.org] able to accommodate to huge deformations without crystal fractures.

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