Survey report: intersections of mining and agriculture, Boddington Radius

There is considerable evidence that the recent strength of Australia’s export oriented mining sector has contributed to economic growth both nationally and in the main mining states and regions although at uneven rates of growth. However investigation and analysis of the internal distribution of costs and benefits from mining within host regions transitioning from agricultural economies has been limited.This document reports results from a survey conducted by the lead author in the Peel Region during March-June 2012 as a part of the Regions in Transition (RiT) project under the umbrella of the CSIRO Minerals Down Under Flagship. The survey examines changing patterns of workforce participation, changing patterns of rural land use, income and expenditure flows and cross-sectoral influences between mining and agriculture. The targeted survey sample comprises adults over 18 years of age either living or working within a radius of approximately 50 km from Boddington town in the most sparsely populated shire of the region, where two separate mineral extraction and processing operations have been undergoing significant expansion. The data reveals that during the RiT project period (2009-2012) these developments triggered a considerable change in the existing socio-economic fabric sustaining proximate towns, communities and individuals. The particularities of the case mean that this report is most relevant to those with a close interest in the future wellbeing of the Boddington 50 km Radius during and beyond the life of current mining operations.The survey also makes a contribution to the wider literature concerning the socio-economic implications of mining. It investigates and confirms the possibility raised by Hajkowicz et al (2011) that the quantifiable benefits of mineral wealth they identify across 71 LGAs may “mask highly localised inequalities and disadvantage”. By providing a nuanced account of the uneven impacts of mining experienced in one region, the survey serves to illuminate the temporally specific economic trends in mining LGAs that Measham and Reeson (2011) identify from ABS statistical data. The findings presented here are undergoing further analysis as a component of an interdisciplinary study at Curtin Graduate School of Business utilizing economic multiplier analysis and qualitative social data to track and map economic impacts of mine operations income expenditure at regional and state level

Velocity Profiles in a Cylindrical Liquid Jet by Reconstructed Velocimetry

An experimental setup and a simple reconstruction method are presented to measure velocity fields inside slightly tapering cylindrical liquid jets traveling through still air. Particle image velocimetry algorithms are used to calculate velocity fields from high speed images of jets of transparent liquid containing seed particles. An inner central plane is illuminated by a laser sheet pointed at the center of the jet and visualized through the jet by a high speed camera. Optical distortions produced by the shape of the jet and the difference between the refractive index of the fluid and the surrounding air are corrected by using a ray tracing method. The effect of the jet speed on the velocity fields is investigated at four jet speeds. The relaxation rate for the velocity profile downstream of the nozzle exit is reasonably consistent with theoretical expectations for the low Reynolds numbers and the fluid used, although the velocity profiles are considerably flatter than expected.This work was sponsored by EPSRC grant number RG5560

Functionalized Transparent Surfaces with Enhanced Self-Cleaning against Ink Aerosol Contamination

During operation of a standard commercial inkjet printer, suspended ink particles form an ink aerosol inside the printing chamber that can cause serious malfunctions, including contamination of the transparent window of the printhead position calibration optical sensors. In this work, transparent conducting film (TCF) and surface functionalization through self-assembled monolayer (SAM) are proposed and investigated to repel ink aerosol deposition on a transparent surface and to reduce its adverse effects. The results show that the combination of the Joule heating effect induced by applying an electrical current to the TCF and hydrophobic property of the SAM reduces transmittance loss from an average of 10% to less than 1.5%. Correspondingly, the area of the surface covered by ink decreases from 45.62% ± 6.15% to 1.71% ± 0.25%. The preliminary results are obtained with glass substrates and subsequently extended to the plastic window of a commercial inkjet printer calibration sensor, thus demonstrating the potential of the proposed approach to reduce aerosol contamination in real applications.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Jetting, in-nozzle meniscus motion and nozzle-plate flooding in an industrial drop-on-demand print head

The state of the ink film at and near the nozzles of a drop-ondemand(DoD) print head during jetting has a direct impact on printing performance and reliability. We have developed highspeed imaging apparatus and analytical techniques to investigate the ink film dynamics on an industrial print head nozzle-plate in real-time. In addition to a direct correlation between the jet emergence velocity and drive voltage, drive-dependent variations in the oscillation of the ink meniscus in adjacent nozzles were also observed. Using a ray-tracing model to analyze the meniscus shape, the meniscus oscillations for both printing and nonprinting nozzles were found to be complex and involve elements such as pre-oscillation and high-order surface waves. The flooding of non-firing nozzles, deliberately caused by the application of maximum drive voltage to a neighboring nozzle, has been recorded and analyzed dynamically. The build-up of fluid in an annulus around the nozzle (flooding rate) has been characterized and compared with models for the net ink flow through the nozzle

Jetting behavior of polymer solutions in drop-on-demand inkjet printing

The jetting of dilute polymer solutions in drop-on-demand printing is investigated. A quantitative model is presented which predicts three different regimes of behaviour depending upon the jet Weissenberg number Wi and extensibility of the polymer molecules. In regime I (Wi L) the chains remain fully extended in the thinning ligament. The maximum polymer concentration at which a jet of a certain speed can be formed scales with molecular weight to the power of (1-3ν), (1-6ν) and -2ν in the three regimes respectively, where ν is the solvent quality coefficient. Experimental data obtained with solutions of mono-disperse polystyrene in diethyl phthalate with molecular weights between 24 - 488 kDa, previous numerical simulations of this system, and previously published data for this and another linear polymer in a variety of “good” solvents, all show good agreement with the scaling predictions of the model

A Simple Model for DoD Inkjet Frequency Response

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from the Society for Imaging Sciences and Technology.A simple linear model of piezo DoD inkjet print-head jetting output (drop speed, volume, momentum) provides an analytic prediction for the frequency response for steady state and initial printing streams from nozzles. The model has been applied to both existing commercial and development inkjet print-head devices.This work was performed under a UK EPSRC Impact Acceleration Knowledge Transfer Fellowship (grant no. EP/K503757/1). Xaar and other consortium members within the I4T (innovation in industrial inkjet technology) project (grant no. EP/H018913/1) gave permission to publish the results and also provided further support. Mario Massucci and Marko Dorrestijn (Xaar Cambridge), and Eva Singler and Ingo Reinhold (Xaar Sweden), all shared their piezo DoD print-head data for this paper

Dependence of drop speed on nozzle diameter, viscosity and drive amplitude in drop-on-demand ink-jet printing

Results of recent experiments and numerical simulations are presented, which have been used to establish empirical rules for the dependence of drop speed on nozzle diameter and drive amplitude for Newtonian and non-Newtonian fluids printed with a range of different ink-jet print-head technologies. Experiments were carried out with Xaar, MicroFab and Spectra Dimatix print heads and with solutions of polystyrene in diethyl phthalate as model fluids. These results are compared with predictions from recent numerical codes developed by collaborators in the University of Leeds, and from simple models for drop-on-demand fluid jetting resulting from physical law

Aerodynamic effects in ink-jet printing on a moving web

This work was sponsored by EPSRC grant number RG5560

Standardization Of Inkjet Drop Speed Measurement Methods For Printed Electronics

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from the Society for Imaging Sciences and Technology via http://ist.publisher.ingentaconnect.com/contentone/ist/nipdf/2015/00002015/00000001/art00029Methods for measurement of inkjet-printed drop speed at various precision levels were proposed in a draft international standard by IEC TC119: Printed Electronics WG3 - Equipment. These are reviewed and discussed for feedback by NIP31/DF2015