Posted on

Sneeze Guards: A Front-line PPE for Multiple Industries

PPE Sneeze Guard
Coronavirus
Ultrastructural morphology of coronaviruses (Source)

The now notorious Coronavirus disease 2019 (or COVID-19) is a dangerous, sometimes fatal respiratory illness caused by a virus called SARS-CoV-2. By now—thanks to exposure to TV, magazine, and newspaper reports—everyone in America must be something of an expert on the Covid-19 coronavirus: what it is, disease symptoms, how it is transmitted, and ways to minimize the spread of infection. These include:

  • Wearing of face masks
  • Thorough and frequent handwashing
  • Keeping a 6-foot distance from other people
  • Avoidance of crowded, enclosed spaces
  • Use of personal protective equipment, where appropriate

OSHA defines personal protective equipment, commonly referred to as “PPE,” as equipment worn to minimize exposure to hazards that cause serious workplace injuries and illnesses. These injuries and illnesses may result from contact with chemical, radiological, physical, electrical, mechanical, or other workplace hazards. Personal protective equipment may include items such as gloves, safety glasses and shoes, earplugs or muffs, hard hats, respirators, or coveralls, vests, and full body suits. It can also include equipment that is not worn yet still protects individuals from disease hazards. One good example is the humble sneeze guard. Continue reading “Sneeze Guards: A Front-line PPE for Multiple Industries”

Posted on

Properties and Uses of CarboSix Carbon Fiber Profiles

Framing Tech CarboSix profiles

Introducing CarboSix

The basis of CarboSix profiles is carbon fiber. Carbon fiber is composed of carbon atoms bonded together to form a long chain. The fibers are extremely stiff, strong, and light and are used in many processes to create excellent building materials.

As you can tell from the image above, our CarboSix modular carbon fiber profiles can be shaped and cut in much the same way our extruded aluminum T-slot profiles are. True, you can use CarboSix much like aluminum, and it has the same structural modularity. And from cutting to perforation, it can undergo the same processing. It even uses the same kind of accessories as aluminum, with identical installation and fastening systems.

But that doesn’t mean aluminum and carbon fiber profiles are perfectly interchangeable. CarboSix is really best reserved for certain applications unsuitable for aluminum or steel, and that take advantage of the unique, specific properties of carbon fiber. Here are the most notable applications for CarboSix: Continue reading “Properties and Uses of CarboSix Carbon Fiber Profiles”

Posted on

Top Three Benefits of Using Carbon Fiber To Build Robots

The Society of Robots reports that carbon fiber has become an essential material for robots now and in the future, because it is very strong in compression and tension while being exceptionally lightweight. Robotic components, particularly , can be fabricated into any size or shape with the benefit being:

  1. Reduced weight
  2. Increased part stiffness
  3. Improved automation processes

Industrial automations’ increased speed and greater precision is vital for improved efficiency, and one way to achieve this is through reduced weight and increased stiffness of robotic parts. The benefits of carbon fiber, as explained here by Antonio Gervosi, from CarboSix, translate directly to:

  • Increased speed on the production line
  • Higher precision
  • Reduced motor and actuator loads
  • Improved reliability
Continue reading “Top Three Benefits of Using Carbon Fiber To Build Robots”
Posted on

Wrought Aluminum Alloys Guide [Infographic]

Framing Tech aluminum extrusions

Aluminum is aluminum is aluminum…right?

Well, not exactly. The base properties of elemental aluminum are well documented and have been described extensively on this website. The properties of this remarkable metal include (but are not limited to):

  • Lightness
  • Reyclability
  • Ductility
  • Malleability
  • Reflectivity
  • Corrosion-resistance
  • Strength at low temperatures
  • Electrical and thermal conductivity

And thanks in part to its prevalence in Earth’s crust, hardly a day goes by when the average American does not come into contact with some form of aluminum or see it in action. Continue reading “Wrought Aluminum Alloys Guide [Infographic]”

Posted on

Framing Tech Aquarium Stand Film Festival

Framing Tech with film strip

So Santa was good to you this Christmas. And with your holiday windfall you’ve decided it may be time to take the leap into turning your lifelong dream of becoming a serious aquarist into a reality. We’re not talking about a kid’s little fish tank here with a few freshwater guppies destined in short order for the porcelain cemetery; but a full-fledged, grown-up aquarium. And if you’re really feeling it, maybe even a saltwater tank.

Hold your horses, my friend. This is a decision not to be taken lightly. Lives are at stake (fish lives matter too, you know). The complexities of the setup alone can be daunting, not to mention the time and money commitment required in maintaining what is, after all, a complex, self-contained ecosystem, populated with living creatures for which you and you alone are responsible. But that’s the whole point, isn’t? Therefore, planning is everything.

Continue reading “Framing Tech Aquarium Stand Film Festival”

Posted on

Extruded Aluminum Profiles: Product Accessories Guide [Infographic]

FramingTech Product Accessories

As mentioned in our last blog article, by themselves our Extruded Inch and Metric T-slot Aluminum Profiles provide the perfect, versatile aluminum fabrication solutions to a host of customer needs, from shelves and aquarium stands, to carts and enclosures, to tables and workbenches, and more. But when our superior fabrications are customized with the just the right accessories, they go from great to extraordinary.

This infographic below provides in one place a handy guide to all the useful accessories available on our website for our inch and metric extruided aluminum profiles.

(Click on this image to download a printable PDF of our Product Accessories Guide infographic.) Continue reading “Extruded Aluminum Profiles: Product Accessories Guide [Infographic]”

Posted on

FramingTech’s Secret Sauce: Accessories

Save 10% on all FramingTech accessories

Details make perfection, and perfection is not a detail.

— Leonardo Da Vinci

Word to the Wise: Accessorize

Some things simply go together—they’re just right when paired. Think peanut butter and jelly. Bogey and Bacall. Bacon and eggs. Abbott and Costello. Fish and chips. Astaire and Rogers. Franks and beans.

The list goes on. Individually, each is wonderful in its own way. But when they pair up, the results are magical.

What is true of the kitchen and Hollywood is also true at FramingTech. By themselves, our Extruded Inch and Metric T-slot Aluminum Profiles provide the perfect, versatile aluminum fabrication solutions to a host of customer needs, from shelves and aquarium stands, to carts and enclosures, to tables and workbenches, and more. But when our superior fabrications are customized with the just the right accessories, they go from great to extraordinary.

In the art world they call adding those little extra details the pièce de résistance. Here at FramingTech we call it “attention to detail.” Here is just a sampling of the kinds of accessories available on our website. Continue reading “FramingTech’s Secret Sauce: Accessories”

Posted on

Everyday Aluminum: Europe Edition

Aluminum building in Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium

Guest Blog by Frank Weaver

It is the most abundant metallic element in the Earth’s crust—and, as it happens, one of the most useful to humans in our industrial age. I am referring, or course, to aluminum. Most people in the United States come in contact with aluminum every day, in one form or another, most typically in the kitchen. But beyond cooking utensils and aluminum foil, this metal has been put to use in myriad applications outside the home. Indeed, it is estimated that each year every single person in the U.S. uses more than 3,600 pounds of bauxite ore (from which aluminum is extracted) in their daily lives.

Aluminum is everywhere. Of course, we at FramingTech deal with it all the time, in the form of our T-slot aluminum extrusions and related structural framing products. And yet ironically, because it has become so commonplace, many of us tend to take it for granted. Nevertheless, the more you learn about this ubiquitous and versatile metal, the more you will notice and be fascinated by it.

On a recent trip to Europe, I made a conscious effort to “notice” and document the many ways that aluminum is put to use, often in ways we are not even aware of. Continue reading “Everyday Aluminum: Europe Edition”

Posted on

Aluminum Aquarium Stand Selection Guide [Infographic]

Clownfish in an aquarium

Congratulations! After months of feverishly mulling it over, you have finally decided to dive head-first into the fun and rewarding hobby of Serious Aquarist. No little ornamental fish bowl for you, but a decent-sized, grown-up aquarium: not just something small and pretty to look at (and then ignore), but a full-fledged, complex, living ecosystem. Now all you need to do is take the leap. Continue reading “Aluminum Aquarium Stand Selection Guide [Infographic]”

Posted on

Aquarium Stands: What Size Should I Get?

Aquarium fish

“I will go back to the great sweet mother,
Mother and lover of men, the sea.”

— Algernon Charles Swinburne (‘The Triumph of Time’)

All life on Earth ultimately rose from the sea. Is it any wonder, then, that people have always felt mysteriously drawn back to the ocean—or indeed to any fair to middling size body of water—as if a child back into the loving arms of its mother? Whether lounging beside a crystalline lake, on the banks of a flowing river, or at the wave-lapped ocean’s edge, humans always seem to feel most at peace. If we could, many of us would prefer not just to live near such soul-cleansing waters, but to live in them. As air-breathers, unfortunately, that is simply not possible. What is possible, however, is to invite a small part of that watery world into our homes—in the form of an aquarium. Continue reading “Aquarium Stands: What Size Should I Get?”