omniomni/omni-engineering huggingface dataset:
Decorticator. A decorticator (from Latin: cortex, bark) is a machine for stripping the skin, bark, or rind off nuts, wood, plant stalks, grain, etc., in preparation for further processing.

History

In 1933, a farmer named Bernagozzi from Bologna manufactured a machine called a "scavezzatrice", a decorticator for hemp. A working hemp decorticator from 1890, manufactured in Germany, is preserved in a museum in Bologna.  

In Italy, the"scavezzatrice" faded in the 1950s because of monopolisation from fossil fuel, paper interests, synthetic materials and from other less profitable crops.

Many types of decorticators have been developed since 1890.

In 1919, George Schlichten  received a U.S. patent on his improvements of the decorticator for treating fiber bearing plants. Schlichten failed to find investors for production of his decorticator and died in 1923, a broken man. His business was revived a decade after death in 1933.

Newer, high-speed kinematic decorticators, use a different mechanism, enabling separation into three streams; bast fibre, hurd, and green microfiber.

Current usage

In some decorticators, the operation is "semi-automatic", featuring several stops during operation, while more modern systems, such as high-speed kinematic decorticators, are fully automatic.

There are companies who produce and sell decorticators for different crops.

References 

Agricultural machinery
School of Electrotechnics Zagreb. School of Electrical Engineering Zagreb () is a IT and Engineering school. It was founded in 1959 as Center for educating "Rade Končar". In 1991 the school changed its name to School of Electrical Engineering which is still its name. School headmaster is Renato Matejaš.

External links
Electrotehnic school site

Schools in Croatia
Education in Zagreb
Educational institutions established in 1959
Buildings and structures in Zagreb
1959 establishments in Yugoslavia
Franz Wittmann (physicist). Franz Wittman (16 January 1860 in Hódmezővásárhely – 1932 in Budapest) was a Hungarian electrical engineer and physicist. He was educated at the University of Budapest and continued his studies in Vienna, Berlin, Paris, Frankfurt-am-Main, Darmstadt and Hanover. In 1892, he was appointed professor of physics at the polytechnic in Budapest. Five years later, he became a member of the royal patent bureau and secretary of the board of examiners for teachers in intermediate schools.

Wittmann's works, which have made him the leading Hungarian authority on electrotechnics, include the following:
 "Az Inductiv Taszításról" (on inductive repulsion)
"Periodikus Áramok Optikai Vizsgálata" (optical tests of periodical currents)
"Budapest Villamvilágításáról" (electric lighting of Budapest)
"Az Erős Villamáramok Technikája" (technics of strong electric currents)
"A Leydeni Batteriák és Induktoriumok Áramának Vizsgálata és Objektív Előállítása" (objective production of currents from Leyden jars and inductors);
"Kondensatorok Áramának Vizsgálata és Objectív Előállítása" (test and objective production of currents from condensers);
"Akusztikai Kísérletek" (acoustic experiments)

In addition to these works, Wittmann has published numerous articles on the technical uses of electricity and heat.

References 

1860 births
1932 deaths
19th-century Hungarian  physicists
20th-century Hungarian  physicists
Hungarian electrical engineers
Hungarian Jews
Budapest University alumni
Hungarian expatriates in Germany
People from Hódmezővásárhely
Jewish physicists
Hungarian physicists
Engineers from Austria-Hungary
EMD GP40X. An EMD GP40X is a 4-axle diesel-electric locomotive built by General Motors Electro-Motive Division between December 1977 and June 1978. Power for this unit was provided by a turbocharged 16-cylinder 16-645F3B engine which could produce . 23 examples of this locomotive were built for North American railroads. This unit was a pre-production version meant to test technologies later incorporated into EMD's 50-series locomotives GP50 and SD50.

Design 
Ten GP40X were delivered with an experimental HT-B truck design that became an option (but never used) on the production GP50, including 6 for Union Pacific and 4 for Southern Pacific. These trucks were meant to improve locomotive adhesion. The remainder rode on Blomberg trucks.

SP's units included several experimental modifications, including L-shaped windshields and coverings over the radiator sections, nicknamed "elephant ears."

1965 experimental locomotive 
The designation GP40X was also given to an experimental locomotive built on an EMD GP35 frame in May 1965. Only one example of this locomotive was ever produced, the EMD 433A, a  test prototype that was the first 4-axle locomotive to be powered by the new 645-series prime mover. The 433A served as the precursor to the EMD GP40.  The 433A was purchased by the Illinois Central Railroad, and became the IC 3075. The 1965 EMD 433A has very little in common with the 1977 GP40X other than flared radiators and a 645-series prime mover.

Original owners

References

External links

 Sarberenyi, Robert. EMD GP40X Original Owners. Retrieved on August 27, 2006
 Thompson, J. David. EMD GP35 Original Owners, GP40 Prototype. Retrieved on August 27, 2006
 Kristopans, Andre J. http://utahrails.net/ajkristopans/50SERIES.htm 

GP40X
B-B locomotives
Experimental locomotives
Diesel–electric locomotives of the United States
Railway locomotives introduced in 1977
Standard gauge locomotives of the United States
EMD SD40X. The EMD SD40X is a 6-axle experimental diesel-electric locomotive built by General Motors Electro-Motive Division between 1964 and 1965. Nine examples of this locomotive were built for test purposes to test the new 645-series prime mover 16-645E3. After testing, eight were sold to the Union Pacific Railroad and one example to the Gulf, Mobile and Ohio Railroad. This locomotive is an experimental testbed for the production SD40, but built on the shorter SD35 frame. This locomotive was also known as an SD35X.

The designation SD40X was also given to an experimental version of the SD50, built by EMD on an SD40-2 frame. Four examples of this SD40X were built in 1979 and were delivered to the Kansas City Southern as KCS 700-703.

References

External links
 Thompson, J. David. EMD SD35, SD40X (Prototypes) and related models Original Owners

SD40X
C-C locomotives
Experimental locomotives
Diesel–electric locomotives of the United States
Railway locomotives introduced in 1964
Megatech (Indonesian company). Megatech was a Bermuda-registered company that pursued the development of various supercars. It was jointly owned by Hutomo (Tommy) Mandala Putra, the youngest son of President Suharto of Indonesia, and Mycom Setdco, a Bermuda-based subsidiary of Mycom Bhd.

In 1994, MegaTech purchased the Lamborghini brand for $40 million. It then sold it to Audi AG in 1998 for $110 million. It also caused the closure of Vector Aeromotive in 1993, when the company attempted a hostile takeover at the expense of Vector founder Jerry Wiegert.

Models
 Vector M12
 Vector SRV8

References

External links
Automotive Company in Indonesia

Offshore companies of Bermuda
Car manufacturers of Indonesia
Platinum hexafluoride. Platinum hexafluoride is the chemical compound with the formula PtF6, and is one of seventeen known binary hexafluorides. It is a dark-red volatile solid that forms a red gas. The compound is a unique example of platinum in the +6 oxidation state. With only four d-electrons, it is paramagnetic with a triplet ground state.  PtF6 is  a strong fluorinating agent and one of the strongest oxidants, capable of oxidising xenon and O2.  PtF6 is octahedral in both the solid state and in the gaseous state. The Pt-F bond lengths are 185 picometers.

Synthesis
PtF6 was first prepared by reaction of fluorine with platinum metal.  This route remains the method of choice.

Pt + 3 F2 → PtF6

PtF6 can also be prepared by disproportionation of the pentafluoride (PtF5), with the tetrafluoride (PtF4) as a byproduct. The required PtF5 can be obtained by fluorinating PtCl2:

2 PtCl2 + 5 F2 → 2 PtF5 + 2 Cl2
2 PtF5 → PtF6 + PtF4

Hexafluoroplatinates
Platinum hexafluoride can gain an electron to form the hexafluoroplatinate anion, .  It is formed by reacting platinum hexafluoride with relatively uncationisable elements and compounds, for example with xenon to form "" (actually a mixture of , , and ), known as xenon hexafluoroplatinate. The discovery of this reaction in 1962 proved that noble gases form chemical compounds. Previous to the experiment with xenon,  had been shown to react with oxygen to form [O2]+[PtF6]−, dioxygenyl hexafluoroplatinate.

See also
 Hexafluoride
 Chloroplatinic acid

References

General reading 
 Holleman, A. F.; Wiberg, E. "Inorganic Chemistry" Academic Press: San Diego, 2001. .

Fluorides,6
Hexafluorides
Platinum group halides
Fluorinating agents
Octahedral compounds
Gases with color
Polypropylene glycol. Polypropylene glycol or polypropylene oxide is the polymer (or macromolecule) of propylene glycol. Chemically it is a polyether, and, more generally speaking, it's a polyalkylene glycol (PAG) H S Code 3907.2000. The term polypropylene glycol or PPG is reserved for polymer of low- to medium-range molar mass when the nature of the end-group, which is usually a hydroxyl group, still matters. The term "oxide" is used for high-molar-mass polymer when end-groups no longer affect polymer properties. Between 60 and 70% of propylene oxide is converted to polyether polyols by the process called alkoxylation.

Polymerization 
Polypropylene glycol is produced by ring-opening polymerization of propylene oxide. The initiator is an alcohol and the catalyst a base, usually potassium hydroxide. When the initiator is ethylene glycol or water the polymer is linear. With a multifunctional initiator like glycerine, pentaerythritol or sorbitol the polymer branches out.

Conventional polymerization of propylene oxide results in an atactic polymer. The isotactic polymer can be produced from optically active propylene oxide, but at a high cost.  A salen cobalt catalyst was reported in 2005 to provide isotactic polymerization of the prochiral propylene oxide

Properties 
PPG has many properties in common with polyethylene glycol. The polymer is a liquid at room temperature. Solubility in water decreases rapidly with increasing molar mass. Secondary hydroxyl groups in PPG are less reactive than primary hydroxyl groups in polyethylene glycol. PPG is less toxic than PEG, so biotechnologicals are now mainly produced with PPG.

Uses 
PPG is used in many polyurethane formulations. Synthesis of waterborne polymers has been a feature with this substance. As the basic building block is propylene oxide, there are 3 carbons per oxygen on the backbone. This confers some degree of water miscibility though not as good as ethylene oxide based molecules. It is used to synthesize the epoxy reactive diluent and flexibilizer, Poly(propylene glycol) diglycidyl ether. Another use of PPG is as a surfactant, wetting agent and  dispersant in leather finishing. PPG is also employed as a reference and calibrant in mass spectrometry and HPLC. PPG and derivatives may be used as defoamers in drilling and other applications. It is also used as a primary ingredient in the making of paintballs. It has been evaluated as a corrosion inhibitor.

References

External websites
  Polypropylene Glycol (PPG) | Monument Chemical
  POLYPROPYLENE GLYCOL | CAMEO Chemicals | NOAA
 Poly(propylene glycol) (polymerdatabase.com)
 Polypropylene Glycol Safety Data Sheet

Polyethers
Decision-matrix method. The decision-matrix method, also Pugh method or Pugh concept selection, invented by Stuart Pugh, is a qualitative technique used to rank the multi-dimensional options of an option set. It is frequently used in engineering for making design decisions but can also be used to rank investment options, vendor options, product options or any other set of multidimensional entities.

Definition
A basic decision matrix consists of establishing a set of criteria and a group of potential candidate designs. One of these is a reference candidate design. The other designs are then compared to this reference design and being ranked as better, worse, or same based on each criterion. The number of times "better" and "worse" appeared for each design is then displayed, but not summed up.

A weighted decision matrix operates in the same way as the basic decision matrix but introduces the concept of weighting the criteria in order of importance. The more important the criterion the higher the weighting it should be given.

Advantages
The advantage of the decision-making matrix is that it encourages self-reflection amongst the members of a design team to analyze each candidate with a minimized bias (for team members can be biased towards certain designs, such as their own).  Another advantage of this method is that sensitivity studies can be performed.  An example of this might be to see how much your opinion would have to change in order for a lower ranked alternative to outrank a competing alternative.

Disadvantages
However, there are some important disadvantages of the decision-matrix method:
 The list of criteria options is arbitrary.  There is no way to know a priori if the list is complete; it is likely that important criteria are missing.  
 Conversely, it is possible that less important criteria are included, causing decision makers to be distracted and biased in their choice of options. 
 Scoring methods, even with weighting, tend to equalize all the requirements.  But a few requirements are "must haves". If enough minor criteria are listed, it is possible for them to add up and select an option that misses a "must have" requirement. 
 The values assigned to each option are guesses, not based on any quantitative measurements.  In fact the entire decision matrix can create the impression of being scientific, even though it requires no quantitative measurements of anything at all.

Morphological analysis
Morphological analysis is another form of a decision matrix employing a multi-dimensional configuration space linked by way of logical relationships.

See also
 MCDA
 Belief decision matrix

References 

Decision analysis
Furoshiki. are traditional Japanese wrapping cloths traditionally used to wrap and/or to transport goods. Consideration is placed on the aesthetics of , which may feature hemmed edges, thicker and more expensive materials, and hand-painted designs; however,  are much less formal than , and are not generally used to present formal gifts.

While they come in a variety of sizes, they are typically almost square: the height is slightly greater than the width.

Traditional materials include silk or cotton, but modern  are available in synthetic materials like rayon, nylon, or polyester.

History 
The first  cloths were  ("wrapping"), used during the Nara period from 710 to 794 AD as protection for precious temple objects. Known as  during the Muromachi period; the term  (literally "bath spread", from , and ) is said to have come about after high-ranking visitors to bathhouses packed their belongings in cloth decorated with their family crest.

They became popular in the Edo period with increased access to bathhouses by the general public; moreover, cloths with family crests grew in demand as common people gained the right to have family crests during the Meiji period.

 usage declined in the post-war period, in large part due the proliferation of paper and plastic bags available to shoppers. In recent years, however, it has seen a renewed interest as environmental protection has become a greater concern. In 2006, Japanese Minister of the Environment, Yuriko Koike, showcased a specially-designed  cloth to promote environmental awareness. In 2020, The Observer reported a growing interest in  in the UK, in part as a response to its perceived greater environmental sustainability compared to traditional single-use wrapping paper.

In a 2023 interview, a Kyoto manufacturer of furoshiki, founded in 1937 said that furoshiki are now used as bags or pillow cover in Japan.

Material, size, pattern
Modern  may be made from fabrics of various thicknesses and price points, including silk, , cotton, rayon, and nylon. The cloth is typically square, although not a perfect square, to facilitate the wrap. Sizes vary, from  and  up to .
The main pattern is always on the bottom half, so it shows in the center. The gift should fit into one third of a furoshiki. Fabric patterns can contain traditional motifs such as cranes, turtles and pines and are double-sided prints.

The Ministry of the Environment of Japan has published a leaflet with 14 folding patterns.

See also 
 , a type of Japanese textile used for gift-wrapping or for purifying equipment during a Japanese tea ceremony
 , a similar square cloth in Korea
 , a thin Japanese hand towel made of cotton

References

External links

 Some common furoshiki folding patterns
 Youtube: Kakefuda, Kyoto (Another tutorial videoclip).

Culture of Japan
Textile arts of Japan
Japanese words and phrases
Polycrase. Polycrase or polycrase-(Y) is a black or brown metallic complex uranium yttrium oxide mineral with the chemical formula . It is amorphous. It has a Mohs hardness of 5 to 6 and a specific gravity of 5. It is radioactive due to its uranium content (around 6%). It occurs in granitic pegmatites.

Polycrase forms a continuous series with the niobium rich rare earth oxide euxenite.

It was first described in 1870 at Rasvag, Hidra (Hittero) Island, near Flekkefjord, Norway. It is found in Sweden, Norway, and the United States.

References

Mindat with location data
Webmineral

Uranium minerals
Thorium minerals
Calcium minerals
Cerium minerals
Yttrium minerals
Lanthanide minerals
Niobium minerals
Tantalum minerals
Titanium minerals
Oxide minerals
Amorphous solids
Orthorhombic minerals
Minerals in space group 60
Minerals described in 1870
Henry J. Hatch. Lieutenant General Henry James Hatch (born August 31, 1935) served as Chief of Engineers for the United States Army from June 17, 1988 – June 4, 1992.

Hatch was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering in 1992 for leadership in the engineering and construction programs of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and for exceptional management of its programs.

Early life and education
The son of an artillery officer, Henry J. Hatch was born on August 31, 1935, in Pensacola, Florida. After graduating from the United States Military Academy in 1957 with a B.S. degree in engineering, he completed airborne and ranger training at Fort Benning, Georgia, and later earned an M.S. in geodetic science at Ohio State University in 1964.

Military career
Hatch held several leadership positions in Army airborne and airmobile units early in his career. He commanded a company of the 307th Engineer Battalion, 82d Airborne Division, at Fort Bragg, North Carolina; served on the staff of the 2d Airborne Battle Group, 503d Infantry, in Okinawa; and commanded the 326th Engineer Battalion, 101st Airborne Division, in Vietnam in 1968–69. Hatch subsequently oversaw West Point construction work for the Corps' New York District and in 1974 began a three-year tenure as Nashville District Engineer. He then returned to Asia to lead the 2d Infantry Division Support Command in Korea and later directed Army and Air Force construction in Korea, Japan, and the Pacific as the Corps' Pacific Ocean Division Engineer. Hatch was Deputy Chief of Staff, Engineer, for U.S. Army, Europe, in 1981–84. He next served briefly as Assistant Chief of Engineers and then for nearly four years as Director of Civil Works. President Reagan appointed him Chief of Engineers in May 1988.

Post-Military career
In 2012, Hatch joined Dawson & Associates in Washington, DC as a senior advisor focusing on federal environmental and water permitting policy.

Awards and decorations
Hatch's military awards included:

References

This article contains public domain text from

1935 births
Living people
People from Pensacola, Florida
United States Military Academy alumni
United States Army Corps of Engineers personnel
Ohio State University College of Arts and Sciences alumni
United States Army personnel of the Vietnam War
Recipients of the Air Medal
Recipients of the Meritorious Service Medal (United States)
Recipients of the Legion of Merit
United States Army generals
Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering
Recipients of the Order of Military Merit (Brazil)
Elvin R. Heiberg III. Elvin Ragnvald Heiberg III (March 2, 1932 – September 27, 2013) was a United States Army general who was Chief of Engineers between 1984 and 1988.

Awards and decorations
Heiberg's military awards include;
  Army Distinguished Service Medal with Oak Leaf Cluster
  Silver Star
  Legion of Merit with two Oak Leaf Clusters,
  Distinguished Flying Cross
  Bronze Star
  Air Medal with six Oak Leaf Clusters
Army commendation one Oak leaf cluster 
National Defense service medal one Oak Leaf cluster 
Korean war service medal 
Vietnam service medal four  bronze stars
Army service Ribbon 
Army Overseas Service Ribbon Numeral one 
Vietnam Technical Service Honors Medal First class 
United Nations medal Korea 
Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal with 1960– Device 
 Order of the Crown (Belgium) (Commander)
 Order of Military Merit (Brazil) (Grand Commander)

See also

References

This article contains public domain text from 

1932 births
2013 deaths
People from Honolulu County, Hawaii
United States Military Academy alumni
Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni
George Washington University alumni
United States Army Command and General Staff College alumni
Dwight D. Eisenhower School for National Security and Resource Strategy alumni
United States Army generals
United States Army Corps of Engineers Chiefs of Engineers

Recipients of the Distinguished Service Medal (US Army)
Recipients of the Order of Military Merit (Brazil)
Recipients of the Legion of Merit
Recipients of the Distinguished Flying Cross (United States)
Recipients of the Air Medal
Recipients of the Silver Star
Commanders of the Order of the Crown (Belgium)
Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering
Military personnel from Arlington County, Virginia
Burials at Arlington National Cemetery