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Cable carriers, also known as drag chains, energy chains, or cable chains depending on the manufacturer, are guides designed to surround and guide flexible electrical cables and hydraulic or pneumatic hoses connected to moving automated machinery. They reduce wear and stress on cables and hoses, prevent entanglement, and improve operator safety. [1]
Cable carriers may be arranged to accommodate horizontal, vertical, rotary and three-dimensional movements.
Steel carriers were introduced to the market for the first time in the 1950s. Their inventor Dr Gilbert Waninger and Dr Waldrich, the owner of the Kabelschlepp, recognized the great potential of these chains at an early stage.
Until then flexibles such as cables and hydraulic hoses had simply been allowed to hang loose from machines, resulting in damage and rapid wear. Nowadays, plastic (specifically, polypropylene or PP) cable carriers are also widely used.
Most carriers have a rectangular cross section, inside which the cables lie. Cross bars along the length of the carrier can be opened from the outside, so that cables can be easily inserted and plugs connected. Internal separators in the carrier separate the cables. Cables can also be held in place with an integrated strain relief. Mounting brackets fix the ends of the carrier to the machine.[ citation needed ]
Besides only bending in one plane due to the rigid jointed structure, cable carriers also often only permit bending in one direction. In combination with rigid mounting of the ends of the carrier, this can entirely prevent the enclosed cables from flopping in undesired directions and becoming tangled or crushed.[ original research? ]
Today cable carriers are available in many different styles, sizes, prices and performance ranges. Some of the following variants are:
Cable carriers are often used with special highly flexible cables to extend the cables' service life.
Cable carriers are used anywhere where there is moving automation involving the transferral of energy, data, liquids or gases. Examples include machine tools, cranes, car washes, medical and laboratory equipment, automatic warehousing, forklifts, industrial robots, offshore oil rigs and stage technology.
While drag chains are used for several applications and made of different materials, heavy duty drag chains are often created using steel due to its durability. This type of drag chain is often utilised within the oil and gas industry for their offshore operations. [2] A heavy duty drag chain is hardwearing due to the nature of the cabling and hoses that they protect.
A drum brake is a brake that uses friction caused by a set of shoes or pads that press outward against a rotating cylinder-shaped part called a brake drum.
A shock absorber or damper is a mechanical or hydraulic device designed to absorb and damp shock impulses. It does this by converting the kinetic energy of the shock into another form of energy which is then dissipated. Most shock absorbers are a form of dashpot.
A bicycle brake reduces the speed of a bicycle or prevents it from moving. The three main types are: rim brakes, disc brakes, and drum brakes.
A Bowden cable is a type of flexible cable used to transmit mechanical force or energy by the movement of an inner cable relative to a hollow outer cable housing. The housing is generally of composite construction, consisting of an inner lining, a longitudinally incompressible layer such as a helical winding or a sheaf of steel wire, and a protective outer covering.
A hose is a flexible hollow tube designed to carry fluids from one location to another. Hoses are also sometimes called pipes, or more generally tubing. The shape of a hose is usually cylindrical.
Hydraulic machines use liquid fluid power to perform work. Heavy construction vehicles are a common example. In this type of machine, hydraulic fluid is pumped to various hydraulic motors and hydraulic cylinders throughout the machine and becomes pressurized according to the resistance present. The fluid is controlled directly or automatically by control valves and distributed through hoses, tubes, or pipes.
A power cable is an electrical cable, an assembly of one or more electrical conductors, usually held together with an overall sheath. The assembly is used for transmission of electrical power. Power cables may be installed as permanent wiring within buildings, buried in the ground, run overhead, or exposed. Power cables that are bundled inside thermoplastic sheathing and that are intended to be run inside a building are known as NM-B.
An air line is a tube, or hose, that contains and carries a compressed air supply. In industrial usage, this may be used to inflate car or bicycle tyres or power tools worked by compressed air, for breathing apparatus in hazardous environments and to operate many other pneumatic systems.
This is a glossary of firefighting equipment.
An umbilical cable or umbilical is a cable and/or hose that supplies required consumables to an apparatus, like a rocket, or to a person, such as a diver or astronaut. It is named by analogy with an umbilical cord. An umbilical can, for example, supply air and power to a pressure suit or hydraulic power, electrical power and fiber optics to subsea equipment and divers.
A hydraulic cylinder is a mechanical actuator that is used to give a unidirectional force through a unidirectional stroke. It has many applications, notably in construction equipment, manufacturing machinery, elevators, and civil engineering. A hydraulic cylinder is a hydraulic actuator that provides linear motion when hydraulic energy is converted into mechanical movement. It can be likened to a muscle in that, when the hydraulic system of a machine is activated, the cylinder is responsible for providing the motion.
Pneumatic cylinder, also known as air cylinder, is a mechanical device which uses the power of compressed gas to produce a force in a reciprocating linear motion.
Cable management refers to management of electrical or optical cable in a cabinet or an installation. The term is used for products, workmanship or planning. Cables can easily become tangled, making them difficult to work with, sometimes resulting in devices accidentally becoming unplugged as one attempts to move a cable. Such cases are known as "cable spaghetti", and any kind of problem diagnosis and future updates to such enclosures could be very difficult.
A Single buoy mooring (SrM) is a loading buoy anchored offshore, that serves as a mooring point and interconnect for tankers loading or offloading gas or liquid products. SPMs are the link between geostatic subsea manifold connections and weathervaning tankers. They are capable of handling any tonnage ship, even very large crude carriers (VLCC) where no alternative facility is available.
A loading arm permits the transfer of liquid or liquefied gas from one tank to another through an articulated pipe system consisting of rigid piping and swivel joints to obtain flexibility.
A pipe support or pipe hanger is a designed element that transfer the load from a pipe to the supporting structures. The load includes the weight of the pipe proper, the content that the pipe carries, all the pipe fittings attached to pipe, and the pipe covering such as insulation. The four main functions of a pipe support are to anchor, guide, absorb shock, and support a specified load. Pipe supports used in high or low temperature applications may contain insulation materials. The overall design configuration of a pipe support assembly is dependent on the loading and operating conditions.
Flexcom is a finite element analysis software package used in the offshore oil and gas and marine renewable energy industries. An educational version is also available for universities.
A metal hose is a flexible metal line element. There are two basic types of metal hose that differ in their design and application: stripwound hoses and corrugated hoses.
An electrical conduit is a tube used to protect and route electrical wiring in a building or structure. Electrical conduit may be made of metal, plastic, fiber, or fired clay. Most conduit is rigid, but flexible conduit is used for some purposes.