Magazine of e.t.s.v. Thor and the department of Electrical Engineering at Eindhoven University of Technology
28
December 2014
Afscheid Corona
Einde hoogspanningshal Corona in zicht door Flux
Ralph Otten blikt terug | Stella goes USA | Tech
United at Robocup |
Excursions AME & Thales
IEditorial
Connecthor
Volume 7, issue 4 - December 2014
Connecthor is published by e.t.s.v. Thor and
the department of Electrical Engineering at
Eindhoven University of Technology.
Connecthor is published quarterly with a
circulation of 1200 copies and is free for all
members of e.t.s.v. Thor and employees of the
department of Electrical Engineering.
Editors in chief:
Femke Verheggen Martijn van Beurden
Layout editors:
Edgar van Megen Jeroen van Oorschot
Anjo Peeters
Editors:
Manon Eijsvogel Georgios Exarchakos
Pauline van Gelder Birgit van Huijgevoort
Esmee Huismans Suzanne Kuijlaars
Mark Legters
Fer Radstake
Rianne Sanders
Bart Smolders
Harold Vervoort
Cover: Hoogspanningshal Corona
Printer: Jafra drukwerkservice
Editorial correspondence:
Connecthor
Eindhoven University of Technology
Potentiaal 13.35
Den Dolech 2, P.O. Box 513
5600 MB Eindhoven
(040) 247 3223,
connecthor@tue.nl
Web: http://www.thor.edu
http://www.tue.nl/ee
Advertisers:
Page22 Thales
Back cover:AME
Deadline copy next issue: 9 January 2015
Copyright © Connecthor 2014
All rights reserved. No part of this publication
may be reproduced in any way without prior
written permission of the editorial board.
Disclaimer
The editor reserves the right to shorten and
otherwise edit the articles. The views and
opinions expressed in the articles are those of
the authors and do not necessarily reflect the
opinion of e.t.s.v. Thor or the department of
Electrical Engineering at Eindhoven University of
Technology.
02 | connecthor A
t the moment of writing this editorial, everyone in the department is busy with the
upcoming move to our new Building Flux. The move is a huge operation. Once we get
the key of Flux, the first research group, SPS-VCA, will move on Monday 8 December.
December 18th and 19th, the departmental staff of both departments will move to Flux. In
the new year, the other groups will move and this process will take until the end of March. In
this edition we pay attention to the move by saying goodbye to the Corona building and the
Hoogspanningshal with a nice article from prof. Kling.
If you’re looking for inspiration for an internship abroad, have a look at the article by Tom Geelen
about his internship in Chile. Of course we also inform you about the challenge that the new
automotive team Storm will take up; in 80 days around the world on an electric motorcycle.
And let’s not forget one of the highlights of the past period was that Tech United became World
Champion Robot Soccer for the second time at Robocup 2014. Bob van Ninhuijs writes about
his personal experience of this exciting event in Brazil.
The editorial board is currently looking for new members. Are you up for a new challenge and
would you like to contribute to our magazine? We are especially inviting employees of the EE
department to respond.
As always, we will be glad to receive your suggestions and ideas for upcoming editions and
you can contact us via connecthor@tue.nl.
We hope you will enjoy reading this new edition of the Connecthor and we wish everyone
Happy Holidays and a Prosperous New Year!
The Connecthor editorial board
Content I
2Editorial
13
4
Board Issues
5
Wanted: Connecthor board members
6In memoriam
7From the President
8Introducing...
10News
11 ThEW, an unforgettable weekend!
11Social outing of the Buro
12 Afscheid Corona en hoogspanningshal
13Ralph Otten blikt terug
16 Photo page
18 Mid-size league of Tech United at Robocup
20In 80 days around the world on motorcycles
21 AME excursion
21 Thales excursion
22 Werkervaring bij Thales
24Cleanroom visit NXP Nijmegen
24IEEE Day
25Desert, earthquakes, snow and pisco
Ralph Otten blikt terug
Vanaf pagina 13 blikt Ralph Otten terug op zijn carrière.
26Stella goes USA
28 Mythology: Hildebrandslied
30Puzzle
18
31Column
Mid-size league of Tech United
Tech United won the Robocup in Brazil. Read
more about this on pages 18 and 19.
26
12
Afscheid Corona
Op pagina 12 wordt de geschiedenis van de
hoogspanningshal in Corona beschreven.
Stella goes USA
Stella discovered yet another part of the world, with a trip from Los Angeles to San Fransisco.
Read more about this journey on pages 26 and 27.
December 2014| 03
IDepartment
Board Issues
D
oing research is a key part of an
academic job, next to teaching,
managing (in a smaller or larger circle
of influence), and valorization. In a university,
and certainly in a technical university, these
four ingredients cannot exist just on their
own. We would like to bring our students
up to the present state of the art, so up to
the level of the most recent insights and
achievements. It is therefore most useful
when we ourselves are working at these
front levels too. And doing research is nowa-
By: Ton Koonen
not least, in engineering sciences one would
like to achieve results which serve a higher
purpose, i.e. are valuable for our society, in
industry, economy, health-care organizations,
or in the professional and private parts of our
life. The bridge from research results to actual
value-adding applications needs therefore to
be crossed as well.
Doing research in an academic setting is
in several ways quite different from doing
research in an industrial setting. In industry,
anymore, at least not before the best market
opportunities have already been consumed.
It often also requires a patent filing first.
On the academic side, however, we want
to publish as soon as we have achieved
the results. If somebody is ahead of us and
publishes the idea first, the window of opportunity is closed. Our PhD students are therefore energetically and enthousiastically busy
with their research, and have a large drive
to publish at conferences and in journals.
Differently from industry, we want to bring
We want to bring out our research results as soon as possible,
to avoid losing the leading edge
days not an activity of isolated individuals.
It is often done in teams, in larger projects
where each researcher works on a part of the
puzzle. That is where management aspects
arise, in order to have efficient and smooth
interaction, and together work towards the
overarching goal of the project. And last but
04 | connecthor the goal typically is to develop a new product
ahead of the competition, so that the market
can be entered first and benefits can be
reaped at the best prices. Typically, industrial
research is only published after some time,
when the results obtained are so far ahead
of the competition that they cannot catch up
out our research results as soon as possible,
to avoid losing the leading edge. Obviously,
many research groups are working on similar
topics and are competing to get their papers
published. The papers have to go through a
review process to select the best ones. That is
Department I
a tough time-consuming task for reviewers,
who typically have to do that on top of their
normal work, often in their spare time.
Peer reviews (i.e. the review of your work by
colleagues in your field) are highly important
for maintaining and further improving the
high quality level of research. This holds for
the review of publications, of the progress
made in research activities in general, and
also for the review of project proposals. The
reviewers should judge carefully whether
the research you are reporting or proposing
is genuine and original, and whether it gives
due references to related work done previously by others. The latter is one of the obligations we have according to the Code of
Scientific Conduct, recently distributed by
the Board of our university. The Code lists the
obligations we have in doing and publishing
research. We should present results that are
truly achieved, and be clear about any uncertainties and limiting boundary conditions.
We should duly acknowledge contributions
from others by citing their work; plagiarism
cannot be accepted. We should also be open
about how the results were obtained, and
basically make it possible for other people
knowledgeable in the field to replicate our
research results and test them. We should
work in academic freedom, so not be biased
by interests of political, economic or personal
nature. And we should do our research with
a sound responsibility towards society, so
abstain from activities causing harm to our
society and adhere to ethical norms.
Every six years, the research activities in
our EE department are undergoing a peer
review, jointly with our EE colleagues of TU
Delft and University of Twente. Such a review
is important to expose our research activities in a wider context, amongst others for
influencing funding bodies and politicians,
and to promote Electrical Engineering in
general. The previous one was held in 2011,
and covered the period 2005 – 2010. Like
with the peer review of publications, the peer
review of research activities gives an impartial assessment of the quality and relevance
of our research, and is of high value to direct
our research efforts into the direction with the
highest recognition, value added and best
position to attract funding. Our EE department came out very well from this 20052010 review, with marks per group which
were in the front lines of the overall ones in
the EE departments of the 3 TUs. We are now
to prepare for the next review, covering the
period 2011-2016. There is a new Standard
Evaluation Protocol (SEP) for the Dutch
universities that has to be followed; one of
the differences with the previous review is
that the entities to be reviewed have to be
large, i.e. of at least 10 fte research effort each,
and exist in that form for at least 3 years. And,
in order to have a joint peer review with the
EE activities in TU Delft and University of
Twente again, there should be comparable
entities at the three universities. Hence the
upcoming review will be organized at the
level of the EE faculties as a whole, not per
individual group anymore. To get prepared
for this review, there will be a ‘light’ review in
2015, in which we will practice with the new
SEP. This so-called midterm review concerns
the period 2011-2014, and activities to collect
the inputs for the self-evaluation report have
been started. Given the excellent outcome
from the previous review, and the encouraging research results and external recognition we got since then, we can confidently
look forward to this upcoming midterm
review!
Ton Koonen
Wanted: Connecthor board members!
Do you like a new challenge? We have positions open for creative, enthusiastic employees and students of de Department of Electrical
Engineering interested in joining us to make the Connecthor magazine.
We are especially looking for:
Editors
Editors ensure the written quality of print and online publications. Their duties include developing ideas for new articles, approaching
people to write or write articles themselves, making sure that a writer’s formatting fits house-style guidelines, correcting grammatical or
factual errors and making suggestions for improvement.
Layout editors
Layout editors are primarily responsible for designing the format of publications. They utilize layout software to assemble text, photographs
and other content in an aesthetically pleasing and easy-to-read arrangement. Within the Connecthor board we work with a small team of
layout editors working with InDesign software.
Editors in Chief
The editor-in-chief manages all the day-to-day operations of a publication. He/she oversees all the work of the editors of a publication and
ensures that each issue is released in time. The editor-in-chief reviews all articles and photographs for accuracy as well as potential libel
or slander, and provides suggestions, if needed, about any changes to make before the publication goes to press or is released digitally.
If you’re interested in any of the positions listed above, please send an email to connecthor@tue.nl.
December 2014| 05
In memoriam
Prof. ir. Karel H. Wesseling
I
t is with great sadness that the Managing Board of the Department of Electrical Engineering announces the death of Prof.ir. Karel H. Wesseling
Emeritus Professor in Biomedical Instrumentation.
From 1 November 1990 until 4 January 2000, Professor Wesseling was affiliated with the Medical Electrical Engineering research group, Dept.
of Electrical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology. During this time he supervised many MSc. students with great dedication. He
was an expert in combining his extensive technical knowledge and his insight into human physiology and presenting it with great enthusiasm.
We offer our sincere condolences to his wife, children and other family members on the loss of this exceptional person.
Prof. dr. ir. Ton Backx, Dean
Prof. ir. Ton Koonen, Board Member
Ir. Alfons Bruekers, Managing Director
Prof. dr. ir. Bart Smolders, Director of Education
H
et faculteitsbestuur heeft er bedroefd kennis van genomen dat op 4 September 2014 is overleden Prof. ir. Karel H. Wesseling Emeritus
Hoogleraar Biomedische Instrumentatie.
Prof. Wesseling is van 1 november 1990 tot 4 januari 2000 verbonden geweest aan de vakgroep Medische Elektrotechniek van de
Faculteit Elektrotechniek van de Technische Universiteit Eindhoven. In die tijd heeft hij met grote toewijding veel studenten begeleid bij hun
afstuderen. Hij wist zijn technische kennis en zijn inzicht in de humane fysiologie goed met elkaar in verband te brengen en dit geheel boeiend
te presenteren.
Wij wensen zijn vrouw, kinderen en verdere familie veel sterkte bij het verwerken van het verlies van deze markante persoon.
Prof. dr. ir. Ton Backx, Decaan
Prof. ir. Ton Koonen, Bestuurlid Onderzoek
Ir. Alfons Bruekers, Directeur Bedrijfsvoering
Prof. dr. ir. Bart Smolders, Opleidingsdirecteur
Association I
From the President
By: Birgit van Huijgevoort
I
t was September 24th; we officially became
the Board of Thor. It feels almost like it
happened yesterday. The feeling of happiness to finally wear a red choker (or tie for the
boys) is something I will never forget. Actually
it is pretty strange to feel so pleased about
this, because basically it is a small item. As you
might have noticed, I like writing. When I was
a child, I was a big fan of Roald Dahl. I wanted
to become as good in writing as he. This was
one of my dreams, even the biggest one when
I was young. My other dream was to become
an inventor, like the one you see in animation
movies. More specifically, I wanted to be able
to turn a vacuum cleaner into an independent
robot.
The funny thing is that this might seem an odd
combination and it might seem hard to accomplish both dreams, but the opposite is true. I
am writing this column, which is different than
writing a children’s book, but it is the same
concept. The inventor dream is even more
likely to come true, because as a matter of fact
I am studying to become an engineer. So basically my dreams can still come true, both of
them! Maybe not the way I expected, but this
way might even be better.
I believe I have talked enough about myself,
so I will dedicate the remainder of this column
to stuff more related to Thor. Fortunately, a
lot has happened lately, so there is enough to
talk about; we had the ThEW, the candidates
drink, the annual general members meeting,
the constitutional drink and so on. For me, the
most special happening was the change of the
Board.
On the 22nd of September, the annual general
members meeting (GMM) started. We, the
candidates at that time, had to be present, but
did not really have an important task. On the
third day this was different, because then we
had to present ourselves and our policy. The
whole day I was nervous and to make it even
worse, I had a cold, so my voice was terrible.
Strangely, during the GMM my nerves were
calmed and the presentation went well and
we were chosen to be the next Board of Thor!
On this day, the change of the Board was finally
happening. The funny thing is that I had to lead
the GMM without having a strong voice, I was
almost whispering, so therefore I had to use
Mjölnir (Thor’s hammer) a lot. Using this tool
really made me feel to be the President of Thor.
Leading the general members’ meeting really
was a challenge for me. I like to be prominent,
but I hate making mistakes. Therefore, staying
in the background is an easy way out for me. I
especially hate making a mistake when lots of
people see me making it, which could happen
at a GMM, because everybody is (or should be)
listening to you. Fortunately, I believe I did not
make any (big) mistakes and everything went
well.
Another special activity for me was the constitutional drink. It really felt amazing to stand
there as the Board and have all the other
associations coming over to congratulate you.
Just like the GMM, this was a moment that I felt
very proud to be a Board member of Thor. The
dinner and party afterwards were really nice
as well; we got to know our sister associations
even better than we already did.
As you might have noticed I am very excited to
be part of the Board and I am absolutely sure
that this will be a great year! Not just for me,
because I hopefully will acquire lots of new
skills, but also for Thor.
‘Veel gedonder!’
Birgit van Huijgevoort
President of Thor
December 2014| 07
IDepartment
Introducing...
H
i everybody! I am very pleased that
I can introduce myself as the new
secretary of the SPS Group. My name
is Marieke van Riet and I started my new
position on October 1st. I have worked as
an office manager for almost 10 years at a
consultant agency and nearly 3 years at the
International Relations Office of University
College Maastricht. I love working in an
environment where education and innovation are important, so it feels great to be
part of the TU/e staff. I live with my husband
Peter and our two cats (it took me 12 years
to convince him we should have pets, so
I figured they are worth mentioning) in
Weert, where I was born and raised. I have
not lived in Weert my entire life; I did spent
one year in the US as an exchange student,
H
allo iedereen! My name is Garbi
Singla, I’m almost 27 years old (end
of November) and I’m from Spain, but
maybe more importantly...I’m from a little
town of Gran Canaria, Canary Islands! I know,
which was a great experience and I am very
glad I had this opportunity. It really helped
broaden my horizon.
In my spare time I love to visit the theatre or
the movies, go for nice walks, tour around
in our Alfa Spider and I am very involved in
“Vastelaovundj vereiniging De Schäöpkes”
(not only during the carnival season). Family
and friends are very important to me and
since I am a caring person by nature, I enjoy
having them over for dinner or just spend
time together. This is just a short introduction so you will have an idea who is behind
that new face, wandering through the hallways and who knows, we might actually
meet in person!
I know…you could ask “Why did you come
to the Netherlands?”, and a possible answer
could be “Not to enjoy the beach and the
weather!”.
I studied Electrical Engineering, receiving
my MSc Degree in Telecommunications
Engineering in 2012 and an MSc degree in
Electronics Engineering in 2013, both of
them from the University of Las Palmas de
Gran Canaria (Spain). During the past years
I collaborated with the Integrated Systems
Design Division, as member of the Institute
for Applied Microelectronic (IUMA), working
in the fields of SoC and NoC design for hardware implementation of multimedia algorithms.
Now, I’m starting the PDEng ICT program as
a member of the Electronic Systems group,
of course here at Electrical Engineering. This
program is an opportunity to get to know the
company, and a good stepping stone for my
career. I believe this period here is going to
be very challenging and during the next two
years I will have to get used to the Dutch way
of life! (Goodbye “siesta”, hallo sandwiches for
lunch! :-P).
In my spare time I like to go to the sportcentrum, meet new people and enjoy a nice
beer, and, as a good Spaniard, have good
parties. I’m going to be around TU/e for a few
years so maybe I have a chance to meet you,
so, please, feel free to say Hello!
08 | connecthor Department I
H
i! My name is Maria Puentes, I am 22
years old and I come from Colombia,
a beautiful place I hope all of you go
some day. Specifically I am from Bogotá, a
majestic city located at 2600 m above the
level of the sea, surrounded by mountains.
I did my Master in Electrical Engineering, at
Universidad de los Andes, and finished it on
December 2013. I was working on MV substations in Bogotá, and I had this wonderful
opportunity to come to the Netherlands,
and well here I am, pretty excited and discovering the life in Europe. My work has been
focused on Renewable Energy, EVs and
Power Electronics. Now I have the opportunity to work in an European Project, with a lot
of people with vastly different backgrounds.
In my free time I like to run, swim, or bike. I
used to run in the early morning (around
5am which is pretty normal in Colombia),
but here I have shifted my schedule a little
bit, hoping that I can get used to the evening
exercise. Now I have more spare time since
the commute time is almost negligible, which
is I think what I have loved the most of my
new life; I have the time to work, exercise and
actually sleep.
Kind Regards,
Maria
H
i everyone! My name is Perry van
Schaijk, I’m 25 years old and I was born
in Heesch (a village approximately 40
km to the north of Eindhoven). I obtained
both my BSc and MSc degrees at the TU/e. My
interests are fairly broad, but since my graduation project I have been focusing on the properties of light. That is also part of the reason
I am now joining the Photonic Integration
group by looking into ways to stabilize an
on-chip laser.
several years. Also, I did several student jobs
in this department, such as teaching a master
class and helping freshmen figure out best
practices for studying.
Besides working, I tend to spend a lot of time
playing the saxophone. For quite some years
already, I have been playing in an orchestra
in Heesch. Last year, I thought it was time
for some variation and I joined a big band in
Eindhoven. It is indeed a lot different and as
such it is a real challenge. I do however enjoy
it, just as my new position.
As a part of my studies, I was given the opportunity to do an internship abroad. I took this
chance and Peter Baltus helped me to secure
a place at the University of California, Los
Angeles, to do research on cognitive radio in
the lab of Danijela Cabric. For my graduation
project, Erwin Bente helped me find a position at Philips Research where I thoroughly
enjoyed looking into the polarization properties of light under the guidance of Gert ’t
Hooft.
During my studies, I have been a member of
the study association of Electrical Engineering
and as such I helped organize a number of
activities. Among others, I was in the board
for a year, helped organize the study tour to
Japan, and have been tending the bar for
December 2014| 09
INews
Afscheid Rein van Asten
Op donderdag 30 oktober heb ik afscheid
genomen van de faculteit Electrical
Engineering en van de universiteit. Ik
wil mede namens mijn vrouw graag alle
familieleden, vrienden, collegae en ex
collegae bedanken voor de overweldigende belangstelling.
Dank voor jullie aanwezigheid, hartelijk
wensen, toespraken en cadeaus.
Ik kijk samen met Enne met voldoening
terug op deze memorabele dag en kijk
met genoegen vooruit.
Rein van Asten
Cum Laude Promotie
Electrical Engineering popular
Emil Kleijn van de faculteit Electrical
Engineering is cum laude gepromoveerd.
Hij verdedigde op 11 september 2014 in
het Auditorium zijn proefschrift getiteld
“Passive components in indium phosphide
generic integration Technologies”.
De eerste promotor is prof.dr.ir. Arthur
van Roermund, hoogleraar Elektronische
Schakelingen.
Cum laude promoties zijn relatief zeldzaam. Zo’n vijf procent van de promovendi krijgt dit erepredikaat. Om ervoor in
aanmerking te komen moet het verrichte
onderzoek van een uitzonderlijk hoge
kwaliteit zijn en moet de promovendus
met
uitzonderlijke
zelfstandigheid
gewerkt hebben.
In September 2014, we have seen a further
increase of the influx of new students.
We started this academic year with a
total of 180 first-year students (130 EE
and 50 AU). Next to this, 56 international
Master students and 50 pre-Master (HBO)
students started in Electrical Engineering.
Altogether we have welcomed almost 300
new students this academic year! In the
upcoming years we are going to expand
our efforts in attracting more international students, both Bachelor and Master.
Combined with the growing interest at
recent open-day events and our excellent score in the yearly Elsevier ratings
(best Bachelor EE in the Netherlands), we
expect to expand our intake further in the
upcoming years.
Ludieke uitdeelactie omtrent het uitdelen van de eerste Focus on Flux krant
Op dinsdagmorgen 23 september jl. werd de eerste Focus on Flux krant, samen met een
loep, persoonlijk aan de medewerkers en studenten van de faculteit uitgedeeld.
In totaal zullen verspreid over dit collegejaar 6 kranten verschijnen.
Afscheid Harold Vervoort
De redactie bedankt Harold voor zijn
bijdragen en enthousiasme voor de
Connecthor.
10 | connecthor Association & Department I
ThEW, an unforgettable weekend!
By: Robin Steenbakkers
O
n Friday afternoon the ThEW 2014
started with a delicious dinner at
Potentiaal, after which we received
the route to the address we were staying at
that weekend. We had to go there ourselves
(without any help). Luckily someone knew the
address and led the way, although we lost a
couple of people (but it stayed within the 10%
range so it was acceptable) and they arrived a
couple of minutes later. At the beginning, we
had to hand in our mobile phones. We received
an egg and a cup in return (not a great deal, I
know). We had a great first night with many
fun activities. First the board arrived and then
many other Thor members joined us as well.
We had a great evening together and were told
to go to bed early because we needed every
minute of sleep we could get. But not everyone
listened. They woke us, or at least the people
who were asleep, at ten o’clock. Everyone had
a nice breakfast with the much needed coffee.
After that we had to do morning exercises.
This isn’t a very good idea after just 1.5 hours
of sleep.
In the afternoon, we went to Sint-Oedenrode
(a place not far from Eindhoven) there we went
on two missions. One: to get really cool stuff
for a fuse, and two: to get as many names and
phone numbers on a shirt (which were called
later on that day). After that we went back
and wrote a song about the candidate board,
which was sung to them after dinner, at the
bon fire. It was really nice to talk to everyone
at the bon fire, the board, the candidate board,
the participants and the Oude Bokken.
All were enjoying themselves, laughing a lot
and just having a good time. Everyone stayed
awake until they thought they needed some
sleep, which some people thought they didn’t,
but then again they drank some coffee made
by Bram, so it contained more coffee than
water.
ended up in the middle of nowhere because
they missed the stop. After that we drove back
to Eindhoven where we gave the board our
presents that included some liquorice (which
someone got for his birthday but didn’t really
like), a Thor film and 1100 cans tomato puree.
And with that the awesome weekend ended.
It was an amazing weekend that I will never
forget. Everyone who helped organizing this,
THANK YOU SO MUCH! And I think I speak on
behalf of everyone when I say: “It truly was an
unforgettable weekend!”
On Sunday morning, everyone packed
their bags so they were ready to go back
to Eindhoven. On our way back we went
canoeing. A couple of people ended up in
the water, some even more than once. Others
Social outing of the Buro
By: Lies Termeer
S
eptember 18th provided us with the
most beautiful weather possible. The
outing, considered from a weather’s
perspective, was already a big success.
We walked to the center of Eindhoven where
we were all tested on relevant and also very
irrelevant knowledge present among us. This
all happened in a pub “’t Mulderke” and it
was not even noon yet. The groups were very
enthusiastic and competitive, even though the
team “Zonder Bart” was missing a prominent
member. Two teams were quite close all the
time, but then unexpectedly a third team had
a lucky shot at the number of “Albert Heijn”
supermarkets and ended up winning the
quiz by surprise. Some said it was because
the phrasing of the questions was questionable……of course TU/e people remain critical
as always.
Time to move on to the lunch, as we were
getting hungry, by setting out on foot to Strijp
S. André Amaro’s “Ketelhuis” had a marvelous
lunch for us and we even had the unique opportunity to eat outside. They had some surprising
new food combinations and it was all very pure
and fresh. The afternoon offered all of us the
opportunity to exhibit our dance, drama, and
acting talents as we were told that we were
going to make a lipdup. Quite a few among
us had never heard about a lipdup before and
were moderately in shock after having been
shown an example of what we were about to
do that afternoon. To make things a little easier
we got access to sunglasses, hats, dresses,
boas to cover up ourselves and make us look
unrecognizable. Alfons did his utmost best but
somehow never really succeeded. The professionals showed us our stage spot and off we
went to create and rehearse an original sketch
on the assigned lyrics. Quite hilarious to see
each other dressed up and dance on the tune
of “I got a feeling” of Black Eyed Peas. For most
us it was absolutely out of our comfort zone
but as we were all in it together we developed
a liking for it and enjoyed doing it. The lipdup
was taped in one continuous shot and we
already managed to satisfy the professionals
in the 2nd take. In the final version, that we
received a few days later, you can clearly pick
out the talented actors who may already have
received their first invitation as guest actors in
commercial television. It’s not on YouTube yet,
but you may enjoy it on our local Wall of Fame.
Still under a clear blue sky, we returned on foot
to the city center and enjoyed an Italian dinner
at Happy Italy, a lively new restaurant with a
waiting-line that we were lucky to be allowed
to bypass.
December 2014| 11
IDepartment
Afscheid Corona gebouw en hoogspanningshal
Door: Wil Kling
I
n het juninummer van de Connector is een
tijdslijn gegeven van de groepen die we
door de jaren heen gehad hebben binnen
de faculteit. De groene groepen hebben het
Corona gebouw bewoond, het markante
zijgebouw van Potentiaal (E-hoog). Met
weemoed zullen we het gebouw verlaten.
De bijgevoegde foto laat zien hoe mooi onze
hoogspanningshal er van binnen uitziet. Veel
medewerkers wilden graag deze herinnering
vastleggen en poseerden braaf voor deze
groepsfoto. Helaas was een aantal collega’s
afwezig maar het zal nooit lukken iedereen
bij elkaar te hebben.
Corona was een van de eerste gebouwen op
het terrein. Nadat een belangrijke commissie
ter voorbereiding van een tweede instituut voor technisch hoger onderwijs, onder
leiding van Mr. H. L. s’Jacob, in 1955 een positief advies had uitgebracht en de regering
daarna koos voor Eindhoven als stad voor
de 2e Technische Hogeschool werd al snel
gestart met de bouw van de campus. Er werd
gekozen voor één architect voor het totale
complex, Ir. S.J. Van Embden. Hij bedacht de
structuur met alle hoge gebouwen in een
bepaalde richting en de lage gebouwen daar
loodrecht op. Dat zien we dus ook bij Impuls
en Corona die haaks op Potentiaal aansluiten.
Impuls werd als eerste gebouwd en Prof. J.G.
Niesten werd eind 1956 benoemd als hoogleraar elektromechanica. Enige tijd daarna
verrees Corona en Prof. D.Th.J. ter Horst werd
aangesteld als hoogleraar hoge spanningen
en hoge stromen. Corona is gebouwd door
HVL dat sinds kort onderdeel is van Croon.
HVL bouwde alles, eerst het karakteristieke
deel met de prachtige koepel in het dak
(het eerste hoge spanningen lab, later hoge
stromen lab, dat in 1962 in bedrijf ging) en
enkele jaren later ook het deel met de imposante kooi van Faraday (het hoge spanningen
lab dat in 1970 in gebruik werd genomen). In
1966 vond de eerste promotie plaats door Ir.
W.M.C. van den Heuvel, die later tot lector en
vervolgens tot hoogleraar in de groep werd
benoemd en dat ook bleef tot 1990. Prof. Ter
Horst werd in 1977 opgevolgd door Prof. P.C.T.
van der Laan die de nodige aanpassingen
liet verrichten aan het hoge spanningen
lab waardoor nieuw onderzoek kon worden
opgestart. Alhoewel hij al sinds 2000 met
emeritaat is, zien we hem nog regelmatig in
Corona.
12 | connecthor Naast hoge stromen en hoge spanningen
hebben ook EMC en Elektriciteitsvoorziening
in zijn algemeenheid hun onderzoeksporen
in het Coronagebouw nagelaten. Van het
analoge netwerk simulatie lab is niets meer
terug te vinden maar we hebben nu een
uiterst modern Smart Grid lab en ook voor
EMC hebben we een mooi lab met een specialistische testfaciliteit (reverberating chamber).
Beide labs gaan mee naar Flux. Dat geldt niet
voor het hoge stromen lab, want dat hebben
we al in 2008 gesloten, en ook van de indrukwekkende hoogspanningshal moeten we
afscheid nemen. Daarvoor krijgen we wel een
geschikte nieuwe faciliteit terug: ook een kooi
van Faraday, maar lang niet zo hoog als de
vorige, namelijk slechts acht meter. Echt hoge
spanningen van miljoenen Volts kunnen we
dus nooit meer maken.
Velen zullen zich nog herinneren dat er in ons
gebouw ook een andere bijzondere opstelling aanwezig was, namelijk een zogenaamde
schokbuisopstelling voor een magnetohydrodynamische energieconversie. Deze
hing hoog in het gebouw in het verlengde
van de hoogspanningshal en werd af en toe
voor experimenten ingeschakeld waardoor
het hele gebouw ging trillen. Het was een
enorm verschil met het houten geraamte dat
er nu staat en waarvan niemand weet wat er
in gebeurt. Dat hoort dus voor de duidelijkheid niet tot ons onderzoek. Het directe energieomzettingsonderzoek van Prof. L Rietjens
is lange tijd wel onderdeel geweest van
onze groep, maar na het emeritaat van Prof.
Rietjens en de korte tussenperiode van Prof.
H. Rijanto is het onderzoek verder voortgezet
bij Natuurkunde. Eén van de promovendi in
deze richting was Ir. J.H. Blom en dat was in
1973.
In 2000 kwam hij als Prof. Blom terug naar de
groep om als enige leerstoelhouder te gaan
fungeren voor alle activiteiten in Corona,
zich op dat moment nog niet realiserende
hoe sterk de groei van de EPS-activiteiten
zou worden, met name op het gebied intelligente netten. Ook hij is nog vaak in Corona
aan te treffen, maar ook in Impuls, Potentiaal
en het Auditorium. In 2008 heb ik hem mogen
opvolgen en ik zal de overgang naar Flux in
goede banen proberen te leiden. We zullen
de ruimte, de vrijheid, het eigene allemaal
missen, maar het nieuwe gebouw heeft ook
zijn charmes.
Wil Kling
Met dank aan Prof. M. Antal voor zijn hulp bij
het ophalen van oude herinneringen.
Department I
Ralph Otten blikt terug
Door: Ralph Otten
M
ijn keuze voor een studie elektrotechniek kwam laat en niet met
enthousiasme. Vanuit mijn middelbare school in Tilburg zag men voor mij vooral
een studie Franse taal- en letterkunde wel
zitten. Het was misschien wel juist daarom
de eerste afvaller. Dat wegstrepen ging door
tot alleen wiskunde, natuurkunde en elektrotechniek over waren. Ten slotte heb ik voor de
laatste gekozen en daarmee begint in 1966
de band met wat toen nog de Technische
Hogeschool Eindhoven heette.
Technische hogeschool
Eindhoven
Ik hoorde bij de eerste generatie die onderwijs in het auditorium ontving. Veel colleges
deelden we met de andere technische opleidingen, wat vooral de tentamens tot massale
gebeurtenissen maakte. Ook het gebouw
voor elektrotechniek was nog maar net klaar,
maar had toen al speciale voorzieningen
om een IBM360 computer te huisvesten. De
rudimenten daarvan zijn nog steeds goed
zichtbaar op wat nu vloer 10 heet. Onze generatie zou ik die van de seksuele voorlichting
willen noemen. Op de middelbare school
waren in tal van onderdelen lessen met die
naam geïntroduceerd. Biologie, godsdienst,
geschiedenis en avondvoorlichtingen (na de
ouders) pretendeerden iets nuttigs over seks
te brengen. Tot overmaat werd ook het onderwerp in onze eerste hogeschoolmaanden niet
vergeten, al was het niet verplicht. Het werd
een vermakelijke avond met een enorme
opkomst en sprekers met landelijke roem.
Ook een enkele lokale grootheid nam het
woord, waaronder mijn latere afstudeerhoogleraar.
Het onderwijs van de faculteit in die jaren
was erg goed in de practica en beneden
alle peil in de colleges. Vaak was het laatste
letterlijk een professorale voorlezing uit een
door anderen opgesteld dictaat, dat mondjesmaat ter beschikking van de studenten
kwam. Desalniettemin waren het mooie jaren
waarin de universiteiten een ware revolutie
meemaakten. Ook wij vonden dat we niet
achter konden blijven met onder andere de
bezetting van het hoofdgebouw en diverse
boude uitspraken (“die hoogleraren moeten
ook maar eens eerst een vak gaan leren”).
Hoogtepunten van het vijfjarige curriculum
waren, denk ik, de twee externe stages die op
de fabriekswerkvloer zouden moeten plaatsvinden.
Het was toen nog totaal ongebruikelijk
om kort na een ingenieursexamen te gaan
promoveren. Professor Jess, wiens benoeming
vrijwel samenviel met mijn afstuderen, dacht
daar duidelijk anders over toen hij mij overhaalde de functie van medewerker in “langdurig tijdelijk dienstverband” te aanvaarden.
Bij een bezoek van een professor uit Hawaï
werd mij gevraagd of ik een “PhD-candidate”
was. Ik zei “neen”, maar professor Jess corrigeerde: “dat is ie wel, maar dat weet ie nog
niet”.
Na enkele maanden ervaring met elektromotoren bij Brown-Boveri in Oostenrijk was
ik overtuigd van het nut van computers bij
ontwerpen en aanvaardde de aangeboden
functie in ontwerpautomatisering. Een beetje
geïsoleerd in de afdeling manifesteerden de
“promovendi” van Jess zich vooral in het pas
geopende Walhalla. Daar kwamen toen veel
personeelsleden en werden af en toe ook
afdelingszaken besproken door alle niveaus.
Zo heb ik mij daar tot een afdelingscolloquium laten verleiden.
December 2014| 13
IDepartment
In mei 1973 heb ik voor een afgeladen volle
collegezaal die presentatie gegeven met de
titel “algebra voor E” waarin ik probeerde
over te brengen dat de nadruk op vooral
wiskundige vaardigheden zich in de praktijk niet uitbetaalde. Het bood op zich een
goede academische test, maar begrip bleef
eigenlijk volledig buiten beschouwing. En
dat is nog zo: de vaardigheden worden door
een enkeling in de praktijk gebruikt, zijn snel
verwaterd en nemen nog steeds de plaats in
van heel wat belangrijkere lessen. De enkele
verschillen met destijds zitten in een verder
verdunde inhoud en in plaats van tabellen
gebruiken we nu vooral computers.
In die jaren deden de “vertalingen” van
de opstanden van 68-69 zich voelen in de
inrichting van diverse inspraakorganen en
de oprichting van vakgroepen. De elektronicalaboratoria (EEA,EEB en EEC) samen
met het natuurkunde-derivaat elektrotechnische materialen (EV) zouden samen één
vakgroep moeten vormen die de werknaam
“EF in oprichting” kreeg. Talrijke koddige en
vooral emotionele besprekingen moesten
helpen deze in de zin van de wet bedachte
constructie vorm te geven. Dat werd niks
natuurlijk, maar had een belangrijk nevenproduct: op voorstel van professor Jess werden
de mogelijkheden van een ic-faciliteit (een
ruimte om chips te maken) bestudeerd.
Die faciliteit, EFFIC, kwam er, onder luid
protest van een aantal kroondocenten, dat
vergat dat ze in de nieuwe structuren niet
apart vertegenwoordigd was. Dat laatste,
meer dan alle rapporten en enthousiaste
betogen, deed de afdelingsraad tot inrichting
besluiten. Een zeer complexe ontwikkeling
heeft daarna tot één van de paradepaardjes
van onze campus geleid : het technologiegebouw Spectrum.
Het bleef al die jaren onrustig en het intrigeren, waarbij de persoon vaak niet buiten
beschouwing bleef, leidde tot veel onrust en
stress. Zo werden eind jaren zeventig twee
opeenvolgende portefeuillehouders onderwijs zo ernstig ziek dat niemand die functie
nog wilde invullen. De raad kwam toen met
het besluit dat elke vakgroep twee namen
moest noemen en uit het totaal zou dan
een nieuwe portefeuillehouder aangewezen
worden. In ES was weinig keus en in afwezigheid van de voorzitter zijn de enige twee
kandidaten (een derde was al overspannen)
genoemd. Ik werd unaniem gekozen en werd
tevens plaatsvervangend decaan. In ruil
mocht ik daarna een jaar naar het buitenland.
14 | connecthor Een “leuke” klus die in dat jaar geklaard moest
worden was de invoering van de tweefasenstructuur. In feite een condensering van een
vijfjarig curriculum in vier jaar. Volgens Toon
Verlijsdonk werd het het meest met alcohol
overgoten onderwijsprogramma aller tijden.
Die alcohol werd daarbij vooral door Thor
geleverd dat inmiddels het Walhalla stevig in
handen had. Iedereen is dat curriculum wel
vergeten en het enige dat bij sommigen is
blijven hangen is mijn gedetailleerde relatieschema voor onderwijsonderdelen en een
nieuwe opzet voor het kroondocentenplan
(de “schietschijf”).
Voor een en ander zijn beslag kreeg, was
ik vertrokken naar het “Department of
Mathematics” van IBM Research in Yorktown
Heights (NY).
Intermezzo
Nederlanders naar IBM Research voor een jaar
of zo was een initiatief van IBM Nederland, die
daar ook aan mee betaalde. Echter na enkele
maanden kreeg ik van het onderzoekslaboratorium een aanbod om met een vast contract
verder te gaan terwijl ik een trimester per jaar
college en begeleiding kon blijven geven. In
Eindhoven vond men dat omslachtig omdat
dan steeds een onderwijsopdracht geregeld
moest worden. Men vroeg mij daarom om
onbezoldigd in dienst te blijven. Achteraf
voor mij een dure constructie, omdat ik na
terugkomst de Nederlandse premie voor
sociale verzekeringen moest betalen ondanks
dat mijn belastbaar inkomen hier 0 gulden
bedroeg.
Die terugkomst kwam na 7 keer “een jaartje
langer” bij IBM. Toen vond mijn vrouw het
welletjes. Ik werd gevraagd hoogleraar te
worden in Delft dat toen nog een volwaardige E-opleiding had. De hogescholen waren
inmiddels universiteiten gaan heten.
Technische Universiteit
Eindhoven
De tweede periode Eindhoven begon in 2000
met als eerste werkdag een onderwijsdag in
Rolduc. Daar werd het nieuwe curriculum,
met TIO’s en OGO’s gepresenteerd. Na een
introductie waren discussies in kleinere
groepen gepland, waarna elke groep een
woordvoerder koos die het antwoord op
drie vragen moest presenteren: is het duidelijk, wat zijn de sterke punten en wat zijn
de zwakke punten. De antwoorden die ik
presenteerde waren dat niet duidelijk was
welke progressie over de drie jaren beoogd
werd (wat kan ik in OGO 4 wat ik niet in OGO1
mag vragen), dat een sterk punt was dat wie
daar doorheen kwam zeker de titel verdiende,
maar dat niet veel kandidaten door dat curriculum zouden komen en vrijwel niemand in
de nominale tijd.
De faculteit mocht al heel snel opnieuw
kennismaken met mijn pragmatisme toen
gevraagd werd om samen met professor
Groote van Technische Informatica een
master “embedded systems” binnen twee
maanden aan het CvB aan te bieden. Het
ongelooflijke zat hem vooral in hoe twee zo
van elkaar verschillende faculteiten zo snel tot
een consensus over een programma konden
komen. Die tevredenheid werd voor mij wel
danig verzuurd toen bleek dat het resultaat
vooral als handelswaar gebruikt werd in een
3TU-overleg. Maar de master was nog voor de
invoering van echte masters een groot succes,
en is dat nog!
Amper twee jaar later werd mij gevraagd
of een binnenkort arriverende hoogleraar
niet opleidingsdirecteur kon worden. Mijn
antwoord was dat ie dan op z’n hakken
zou omkeren. Toch was het redelijk dat
ES, de enige vakgroep die toen die twee
Department I
voltijdshoogleraren zou hebben, de directeur
moest leveren. Dus dat moest ik dan maar zijn.
Er waren stemmen dat ik eerst zou moeten
tekenen dat ik het nieuwe curriculum, waar
ik al vroeg mijn bezwaren tegen geuit had,
getrouw zou invoeren. Ik heb niks getekend,
maar het wel volgens ontwerp ingevoerd.
De faculteit stond er wat onderwijs betreft
toen slecht voor. Bij de laatste visitatie was er
zelfs sprake van een rode kaart. Er stonden
twee visitaties voor de deur en ik had sterk de
indruk dat bij het CvB de messen al geslepen
werden. Er was in 1998 hevige kritiek op
met name de laatste twee jaar, het deel dat
spoedig de master-opleiding moest worden.
Zorgwekkend was dat de kritiek terecht was
en dat er in de jaren daarna niets gebeurd
was.
Noodzaak was een master te ontwerpen
die aantoonbaar alle kritiek van de vorige
commissie verwerkte en die in zeer korte tijd
door alle organen binnen de faculteit geaccepteerd kom worden. Hierbij moest aan
de ene kant aangetoond worden dat diepte
afgedwongen werd, beoordelingen objectief
en met een gemeenschappelijke standaard
gegeven konden worden en dat een verplichte
oriëntering op de aanstaande praktijk in het
programma opgenomen was. Aan de andere
kant was een uitleg naar de faculteit nodig die
weinig verandering suggereerde. Daarbij was
het feit dat de invoering pas na het bezoek
van de commissie zou plaatsvinden een voordeel. Na de inlevering van het rapport tot
het alleruiterste vertraagd te hebben en de
indeling ervan in ons voordeel aangepast te
hebben, werden de visitaties succesvol afgewerkt. We waren zelfs de eerste faculteit die
volgens de nieuwe Europese norm werden
geaccrediteerd!
Met de master nauwelijks op de rails kwam
van hogerhand de wens (eis) van een
verplichte minor in het baccalaureaatsprogramma. Zelf was ik niet zo’n voorstander
van proliferatie als het kernprogramma nog
niet naar behoren uitgevoerd kon worden,
maar toen de invoering onafwendbaar leek
ben ik toch maar met prof. Van den Bosch
om de tafel gaan zitten om ieder een minor
te ontwerpen die onze studenten binnen
de faculteit zou houden. In de inmiddels
bekende sneltreinvaart werden “automotive
systems” en “connecting intelligence” voor
presentatie klaar gemaakt. Mijn standpunt
omtrent minoren werd via de presentatie
“minoren, een doorn in het oog” campusbreed verspreid en mijn inschatting dat het
niet langer dan 10 jaar zou overleven ook.
Tot slot
Tot op de dag van vandaag zijn er mensen
die denken dat ik een grote stem gehad in
de bachelor-opleiding van de laatste 15 jaar.
Het moge nu duidelijk zijn dat ik zo’n curriculum nooit voorgesteld zou hebben. Een
accent op oplossen van praktijkproblemen,
het ontwerpen met een gegeven doel en
ruimte voor vindingrijkheid en het leren
beheersen van complexiteit zou ik in een
elektrotechniekprogramma
zekerstellen.
Ik zou dat laten volgen op een propedeuse
die voor iedere technische opleiding voor 80
percent identiek zou zijn en de geschiktheid
voor zo’n opleiding op academisch niveau
moet vaststellen. Een keuze voor welke tak
van techniek komt daarna.
Eigenlijk is in een halve eeuw de gedoceerde
inhoud niet wezenlijk veranderd. Hoogstens
zijn het naslagwerk en de tabellenboeken
vervangen door draagbare elektronica.
Maar ik ben er nog altijd van overtuigd dat
zo’n opleiding een goede student niet kan
verpesten. Dat gold in de jaren 60, toen er
meer gestudeerd werd naast weinig contacturen, omdat er weinig andere tijdsbesteding
mogelijk was. En dat geldt nu nog, al is het
veel moeilijker om prioriteit aan zelf studeren
te geven tussen de vele opties. Dat vraagt om
een andere motivering en stimulering.
Ondanks alles kan ik zeggen dat ik nooit spijt
van mijn keuzes heb gehad. Als ik nu na de
middelbare school een studie zou moeten
kiezen, zou het weer elektrotechniek, of
misschien biologie, geworden zijn.
December 2014| 15
1
5
13
8
20
19
18
7
4
6
10
11
3
15
12
17
2
14
21
16
0
9
1. Intro
12. & 13. Constitutional drink
2. & 3. After intro party
14. & 15. FFF
4. & 5. ThEW
16. & 17. CenThorion
6. & 7. Candidate drink
18. & 19. Roof Potentiaal
8. & 9. Excursion Thales
20. & 21. Open days
10. & 11. AME Excursion
IDepartment
Mid-size league of Tech United at Robocup 2014
Text: Bob van Ninhuijs, Photos: Bart van Overbeeke Fotografie
T
hursday, 17th of July, it is 5:45 AM and
we are gathering at the Tech United
Arena of the TU/e. Everyone who still
has some room in his suitcase is asked to
take some extra equipment along such as
laptops and adapters. And then, at 6:00 AM,
the team of Tech United starts the journey,
with destination Robocup 2014 in João
Pessoa, Brazil. We first go by bus to Schiphol
from which we fly to Sao Paulo. As there is no
connecting flight to João Pessoa, we need
to spend the night near the airport of Sao
Paulo and continue the journey the next day.
On Friday, 18th of July, we arrive at the small
airport of João Pessoa and after a one hour
bus drive, we arrive at the hotel. The hotel is
almost directly situated on a beautiful beach.
Unfortunately, we have a load of preparing
to do before we can enjoy the beach.
After a quick breakfast the next day, the first
day at Robocup 2014, we leave the hotel at
8:00 AM to the venue. We enter the enormous building where all the teams playing
in different leagues will present their accomplishments of the past year. We are guided
by the organization to our league area, the
mid-size robot soccer league, where a bunch
of empty tables and chairs are standing that
will soon be filled by us and our opponents.
Our soccer robots, or as we call them
TURTLEs (Tech United RoboCup Team
Limited Edition), have not yet arrived. They
traveled by cargo ship and should also have
arrived at the time we entered the venue.
Fortunately, it does not take long before we
get the good news, that the TURTLEs have
arrived. As the team is now complete, the
tournament can begin.
The tournament always starts with two setup
days, during these days we calibrate and
tune the TURTLEs on the new field. We developed the software such that we have the
TURTLEs running within an hour on a new
field. However, as this is the world championship, we want a perfect calibration and
tuning. Therefore, we take full advantage of
the two setup days.
The late afternoon and evening of the
second setup day are always reserved for
the technical and scientific challenge. The
technical challenge is a specific assignment
and the scientific challenge is a presentation and demonstration of each team of
their scientific accomplishments achieved
in the previous year. For the technical challenge each team needs to perform a pass
and a shot on goal on artificial grass. During
practice we nailed the assignment, however,
during the actual test it does not work out
as the practice and we come in third. For
the scientific challenge, our team presents
coaching software that lets the TURTLEs
come to the sideline when blowing on a
whistle and by means of a QR code, instructions can be provided. This innovation brings
us the second place.
Monday, 21st of July, the first game day of
Robocup 2014. There are two round-robins
scheduled over three days. The first roundrobin is to eliminate the weakest teams,
however, due to the limited number of
teams, namely six, the first round-robin is
mainly used for practice. Nevertheless, the
first game day is very exciting, especially,
because during the setup days the team
has made a lot of software improvements.
It shows in the first match that the TURTLEs
have some difficulty playing soccer with
the latest version of the software. Luckily,
the opponent was not very strong and also
suffered from difficulties. We manage to win
this game, however, it becomes clear that
we still have a long road ahead of us. From
one game to the other, there are not many
software implementations, mostly bug fixing
and adding small features. There are only five
opponents and it will not take long before
we need to play again. After each game we
have a small meeting were we discuss what
went wrong and decide what needs to be
18 | connecthor Department I
done to improve the software. Fortunately,
we manage to improve the software and win
all the games of the first day. In the evenings
there are no soccer games, which makes it
ideal for recalibration, extra tuning, new
implementations and testing of the software. When the venue closes at 23:00h, we
go back to the hotel where the team usually
splits up into three groups; one group gets
something to drink, one group goes to sleep
and usually one or two guys want to finish
something in the software. Usually everyone
is to bed within an hour because the next
day we will leave the hotel again at 8:00h
sharp.
During the second round-robin, we manage
to win from every team with exception of
Water from China, the team we lost from
in the previous world championship finals.
The resulting semi-finals is also exactly the
same as the previous year. Again this year
the semi-finals existed of Water vs. MRL and
CAMBADA vs. Tech United. On the eve of
the semi-finals and finals everyone is tired
and, therefore, it is dangerous to introduce
It is such a relief and a rewarding moment that
all the effort of the team pays off
anything new that is bug-free. Therefore,
only the more advanced programmers
do some bug fixes and the others are all
checking the calibrations and tuning.
The day of the finals, we are at the venue
again at 8:30h and checking some last stuff.
There is not much time and, therefore, most
of the guys of the team are helping to get
the TURTLEs ready for the semi-finals. It is
a game against CAMBADA from Portugal,
a strong opponent. Luckily, we manage to
win from them, but not by much. As no-one
dares to take the risk and make some adjustments in the software, we prepare the
TURTLEs for the finals. With the experience
of last year, everyone was very nervous. The
game consisted of two times 15 minutes and
10 minutes in between. The robots of Water
are able to look up the free spaces because
their robots are very fast. The keeper is one
the star players this game, as it keeps almost
all the goal shot of Water out. Finally, we hear
the referee ending the soccer game with
3-2 for Tech United. It is such a relief and a
rewarding moment that all the effort of the
team pays off. Shortly after our victory we
hear that AMIGO from the care robot team
of Tech United has won the second place,
which is also a great achievement.
The award ceremony is amazing, to stand on
that stage with all the contesters of Robocop
2014 applauding for your results. After the
award ceremony we have a true Brazilian
steak dinner to celebrate our world championship victory. After the dinner we are
finally able to enjoy the beautiful beach of
João Pessoa. The temperature stays at about
27 degrees 24 hours a day. This makes it
possible for us to fully enjoy the beach on
which we play beach volley for hours deep
into the night.
These results would not have been possible
without the TU/e students who did their
BEP, internship or graduation project within
the team. Do you want to contribute, just
contact techunited@tue.nl.
December 2014| 19
IDepartment
In 80 days around the world on electric motorcycles
By: Tim Gerth
O
n Thursday 2 October STORM
Eindhoven introduced itself as the
new automotive student team of the
Eindhoven University of Technology. STORM
is based at the Multimedia Paviljoen where it
works on an innovative electric motorcycle.
From 3 April 2016, STORM will participate in
the 80 Day Race. In this race, which is only
meant for vehicles without internal combustion engines, STORM Eindhoven will travel
further than any other electric motorcycle
has done in the past.
Electric motorcycles
Building a zero-emission vehicle without
compromising on design, safety and pleasure. This is what STORM Eindhoven means
to realize with an electric motorcycle, to show
the world that e-mobility can be attractive. In
addition to this, the motorcycle gives STORM
Eindhoven a strategic edge over its competition in the 80DR, because traffic jams will slow
you down less. By being the first to drive an
electric series motorcycle around the world in
80 days, the team wants to show that attractive sustainable mobility is possible right now.
STORM Eindhoven team
STORM Eindhoven consists of 29 passionate
and devoted students, who will give up two
years of work in order to complete the project.
There are four Electrical Engineering students
and three Automotive students in the team.
Besides the technical aspects, strategy is also
a major factor of success in this race. The 80
Day Race takes place between eight major
20 | connecthor cities spread around the globe. Eight locations are set, the route between them has to
be drawn by the teams themselves.
Innovations
The technical team of STORM Eindhoven has
six major focus points by which it means to
reinvent the motorcycle. First, it will focus
on safety. Modern cars are equipped with
numerous active safety systems that have
made the car much safer over the years. The
motorcycle has quite a gap to close. To make
this work for the driver, well designed software is necessary to ensure good Human
Technology Interaction. Next is robustness,
as the motorcycle will have to travel a total
of 40.000 kilometres. Traveling 500 kilometres per day means the ride should also
be comfortable, which is another focus. To
enlarge practicality and strategic advantages,
a smart battery system should be created,
smart refuelling as STORM likes to call it. Last
but not least, all of this should not compromise our design too much. Motorcycles are
elegant, let’s keep it this way.
The race is on!
Officially, the team has been kicked-off
with the team launch. With the prototype
unveiling scheduled for June 2015, the
STORM Eindhoven team has started the
design process in early September. The team
has made the necessary first steps in order
to achieve its goal: race around the world in
80 days using only renewable resources and
contribute to a sustainable future. The race
is on!
Association I
AME excursion
O
n Wednesday the 1st of October, a
group of students including myself
visited Applied Micro Electronics. AME,
a company among the large number of technological companies to which the Eindhoven
region owes its nickname ‘Brainport of the
Netherlands’, provides high-tech solutions in
electronics, embedded systems and IT. Rather
than selling products directly to consumers,
AME is aimed at companies lacking the technological resources or expertise to develop
certain electronics or software. For example,
your thermostat at home might have been
developed and produced by AME, but it will
have another company’s logo on it.
During the excursion, we split up in smaller
groups to visit AME’s two departments:
Research, design and development (RD&D)
and Operations. Our group was first introduced to the Kardex storage shuttle, an automated two-storey (!)warehouse that holds
millions, if not billions, of PCB components.
A large part of production is automated: the
components are placed on the circuit boards
via a pick-and-place machine and everything
is soldered simultaneously in a large oven.
Every board is automatically inspected and
tested before leaving the production line.
Only a handful of people are required to
operate both of AME’s complete production
lines!
After Operations we visited the RD&D department, which was a room full of desks with
hand-soldered test circuits, prototypes of
products, and measurement equipment on
them. One desk even had a toilet sitting on
it! The employee sitting there (behind the
desk, not on the loo) explained that the toilet
Thales excursion
S
tarting this year, excursions to companies are linked to courses, and first up
was the Electromagnetics I excursion
to Thales in Hengelo. We departed from the
Potentiaal building at 8 o’clock and arrived
around 10:30h in Hengelo, after some delay
due to the traffic. Once we got the badges
at Thales, we went to a room where we
were received with some coffee and tea, got
some gadgets and listened to presentations.
These included facts & figures of the Thales
company, a presentation on the projects
Thales does in Hengelo (only the unclassified,
however) and we saw the famous movie from
the 90’s of the goalkeeper (those of you who
have been to Thales before will know which
one I mean). After this awesome display of
radar technology, combined with huge automatic guns, we had lunch, another thing that
most people will remember of the Thales
excursion. Here we chatted with the people
who gave the presentations and even with a
random employee who got stuck in the Thor
group, which was a perfect example of the
great atmosphere within the company.
By: Martijn de Kok
could be opened, closed, and flushed using a
remote control, and that it also featured builtin lights. An app to flush your luminous toilet,
isn’t that brilliant? On a more serious note, we
also visited an electrical-interference-proof
room, which was quite impressive to see.
Beside a tour in the company, AME also
provided us with a case to work on. We
received one of their circuit boards and were
tasked with explaining why the designers
made certain choices. This was a great opportunity to put our recent Circuits lectures into
practice.
All in all, I personally enjoyed the visit a lot.
Companies like AME serve a wide variety of
markets, which enabled AME’s rapid growth
and might make the company worth looking
at if you are searching for an internship or a
part-time job. It was a very interesting afternoon, and a big thanks to AME and Thor for
organising this excursion!
By: Elwin Hameleers
The lunch was followed by a presentation
on RF antennas, which was an adaption of
the regular Thales excursion program to
match the subject of the electromagnetics
course (I’m going to spare you the details).
When finished, we went on a tour through
the company to see the antennas that are
being made. We could see the assembling of
Smart-L, Smart-S, and other systems and got
to know interesting facts about these systems
and the navies who use them. We then moved
on to the long-range testing site, which was
outside where pictures of us were taken.
The Compact Antenna Test Range was next,
where we were told how you can do relevant
radar tests in a small room. This was followed
by the Environmental Competence Center,
where they even quizzed us on our knowledge of electromagnetism (luckily it was not
an individual quiz). Afterwards we had a drink
and left the Thales complex (and took some
more photos). We went home after we had
stopped in Arnhem to have a nice dinner,
where we wrapped up our trip in an appropriate manner; with a steak and beer.
December 2014| 21
IAdvertorial
Werkervaringen bij Thales
Edwin de Jong, masterstudent Applied Physics, 24 jaar
I
k was vijf jaar geleden met mijn studievereniging T.F.V. ‘Professor Francken’ uit
Groningen op excursie in Hengelo. We
kwamen bij het bedrijf Thales terecht en ik
De opdracht die ik voor mijn stage zocht,
lag voor mij klaar in Delft. Daar onderzocht
ik met een wiskundige theorie de hoeveelheid informatie die in een radarecho zit en
Mijn stage wordt binnenkort op een wereldwijde radarconferentie gepresenteerd. Dat je
als student zo serieus wordt genomen had ik
niet verwacht.
was onder de indruk van de technologische
snufjes op het gebied van safety en security. Thales bleek een veel groter bedrijf dan
gedacht met wereldwijd meer dan 68.000
medewerkers. Ook in Nederland bleek Thales
meerdere vestigingen te hebben.
22 | connecthor hoe dit verandert als het doel verder weg
is, met als doel dat radars op schepen nog
preciezer doelen op zee aan kunnen geven
waar dat mogelijk is. Dat klinkt heel theoretisch, maar ik leerde om de theorie direct
met praktijk te combineren met een techniek
ontwikkeld door een Thales-afstudeerder in
2011. Omdat ik aangegeven had na mijn
stage te gaan promoveren werd mij de kans
geboden om tijdens de stage al papers te
schrijven, samen met mijn begeleider. Deze
papers zijn opgestuurd naar radarconferenties in Lille en A Coruña in Spanje. Als het
daar goed ontvangen wordt dan zou ik daar
via Thales zelfs heen kunnen en een presentatie mogen geven. De ontwikkelde theorie
zal de komende jaren verder ontwikkeld
worden door mijn begeleider en nieuwe
afstudeerders en stagiairs, met als doel dat
het uiteindelijk geïmplementeerd wordt in
radarsystemen.
Dat ik als student zo serieus genomen zou
worden had ik niet verwacht. Afgelopen
februari ben ik afgestudeerd. De komende
vier jaar ga ik promoveren in Groningen, maar
als ik dat heb afgerond, zal ik zeker Thales in
gedachten houden.
Advertorial I
T
ijdens de waterpolo vertelde ik mijn
teamgenoten dat ik opzoek was naar
een afstudeerplek voor mijn studie
Technische Informatica aan de Hogeschool
Avans in Breda. Mijn teamgenoten adviseerden mij eens bij Thales te gaan kijken. Ik
heb op de site gekeken en vond de combinatie van groot, hightech en internationaal
erg gaaf en besloot daarom te solliciteren
voor een afstudeerplek. Ik kwam terecht aan
de andere kant van Nederland, in Hengelo,
waar veelal producten voor Marines worden
gemaakt. Meer dan 85% van deze producten
wordt geëxporteerd naar het buitenland, dat
had ik niet verwacht in Hengelo te vinden.
De gemiddelde leeftijd ligt hier wel vrij hoog,
maar ik merk dat het gewaardeerd wordt als
er jonge mensen binnen komen met frisse
ideeën. Het wordt gestimuleerd om je mond
open te trekken en kritisch te zijn, dat vind
ik mooi!
In het onderzoek houd ik mij bezig met het
opzetten van een sterke WiFi verbinding op
zee. Als schepen onderling contact willen
leggen via radio of satelliet is dat erg kostbaar, daarom is het van belang om alternatieven te onderzoeken. Het eindproduct dat
wij voor ogen hebben zal bestaan uit een
In juni hoop ik te kunnen afstuderen. Er is mij
inmiddels een baan aangeboden als netwerk
engineer bij Thales. Ook in mijn eerste baan
als netwerk engineer zal ik betrokken blijven
Een WiFi verbinding opzetten die mijlen over
zee reikt. Het lijkt me gaaf om later te kunnen zeggen dat ik aan de wieg van dit project
stond.
demonstratie van twee apparaten die over
een afstand van minstens tien kilometer een
WiFi verbinding kunnen opzetten en met
een hoge bandbreedte data over en weer
kunnen sturen. Ik onderzoek, bouw en test
het project. Het project is in eerste instantie
voor op zee bedacht, maar ook de kustwacht
heeft inmiddels interesse getoond.
bij het project van de WiFi verbinding op zee.
Ik hoop dat het over een paar jaar in werking
is. Het lijkt me dan erg gaaf om later te kunnen
zeggen dat ik aan de wieg van dit project
stond.
Remco IJpelaar, student Technische Informatica, 22 jaar
Op zoek naar een stage, afstudeerplek of eerste baan?
Start jouw carrière bij Thales. Kijk op www.thalesgroup.com/nl
December 2014| 23
IAssociation
Cleanroom visit NXP Nijmegen
By: Lulu Chan
T
wo full years after the first seven students
got their scholarships for their Master
Electrical Engineering from NXP, and
one year after the next batch of five started,
we had the NXP visit of our dreams. On Friday
September 19th 2014, we finally managed to
worm our way into the cleanroom of NXP
Nijmegen. We, being engineering students,
are curious by nature, which is why I guess
they immediately warned us not to touch
anything. They knew us too well.
We started off the visit to Nijmegen with a
presentation and tour through the Regional
Quality Center, which brought back fond
IEEE Day
T
he first quartile was just 4 weeks in and
our first activity as the new board of IEEE
SBE was already a big one. IEEE day was
coming up and we had to think up a plan to
promote the branch.
Many plans did cross our minds, ranging
from a paper airplane competition to a
lunch lecture. However, if there is one thing
we all love, it is pie. So we decided to repeat
the pie-baking contest during the break.
For the evening program we would present
all our committees like the SailCo, the WIE,
SayCheese and the LuCo.
The baking contest turned out to be a huge
success. While the beginning was a bit messy
and chaotic, soon there were 14 pies to be
24 | connecthor memories of lectures on transistors, inverters
and the like. (If there was one sure-fire way to
get us to graduate ASAP, that was probably
it.) The topic of quality control and testing is
closely related to electrical engineering and
we had two enthusiastic hosts for that leg of
the tour, which made it a very interesting lab
visit for us.
After packing ourselves in like puppets going
out on a rainy day, we went into the cleanroom. Once inside, we found it bustling with
activity, which was only logical, knowing the
amount of production that goes on in there.
Yet, there is something tranquil and serene
about the cleanroom when you’re on the
outside looking in. While everything looked
very organized and structured, we quickly
learned not to block the hallway as a group,
otherwise we’d be run over by various trolleys. Some of the students seemed especially
enamoured by the monorail and as a group,
we gawked at a machine processing a wafer
for a good five minutes before moving on.
All in all, it was a worthwhile visit and we
would like to thank our host Joop Bruines,
presenter and QC guide Frank Zachariasse,
and cleanroom guides, Domien Draaijers and
Barbara Sanders, for a wonderful afternoon.
By: Steven Beumer
tested and tasted by our professional jury
consisting of dr.ir. Massimo Mischi and dr.ir.
Bart Smolders.
SailCo, which hopefully are not an omen for
the sailing trip that will happen this academic
year.
After the jury had succeeded in tasting every
pie, they announced the winner: David van
Eijl. Then it was time to open the pie buffet for
every attendant and at the end of the break
there was almost nothing left, except some
pieces of pie that were thrown by the new
board of Thor.
All in all it was a really fun day with lots of pie
and fun and we hope that next year it will be
even better.
However, the baking contest was not the only
thing planned for IEEE day. At around 4:30h
it was time to present some of our committees. There were snacks from the LuCo and
the SayCheese, drinks from the WIE and the
LuCo, the candidate board behind the bar
and last but not least paper boats from the
Varia I
Desert, earthquakes, snow and pisco
By: Tom Geelen
W
hat do you think about when you
say Chile? Well I thought: longest
coastline in the world, Pinochet, and
earthquakes. All these things are true about
the country but luckily it is much, much more,
but more of that later. First, I wanted to elaborate on the experience of going on an internship abroad. Such a decision is not a light
one; you will leave the comfort of home and
friends to go to a place of which you know
next to nothing. I remember arriving on the
airport of Santiago with 2 suitcases and a
backpack thinking: ‘why did I do this exactly
again?’. The thought was quickly followed by:
‘I thought I knew Spanish but I can’t understand a word of this’.
Chile is a very interesting country. It has the
most beautiful nature and diverse landscapes
across the country and the people are very
warming and welcome. But they also have
their quirks. For instance, a lot of people think
South American countries are horrible with
their administration. Well, that is certainly true
about Chile. Everything is documented and
(in my opinion) it completely went beyond
the point of being useful. Within two weeks
of arriving I knew the document number of
my passport by heart since I had to fill it out
literally everywhere. Bus to a different city?
ID-number. Go into the city park? ID-number.
Sometimes even in the supermarket.
Then we have the language. Officially it is
Spanish but they call it Chileño themselves.
Not surprising, since the pronunciation of the
Fun in the desert of Bolivia!
The peaks of the Andes in spring.
words is different and they use a lot of words
that are not in the Spanish dictionary. Even
my Spanish colleague took two months to
properly understand the Chilean language.
So even though I thought I could speak some
Spanish, I had to go back to basics and start
over again. And I had to, since only a very
small percentage of the population speaks
anything else than Spanish/Chilean.
I work here at the astronomy department of
the ‘Universidad de Chile’. Why as an Electrical
Engineer? Well, I work in the instrumentation
team that develops the new equipment for
the big telescopes in Chile like ALMA. So I work
in Santiago at the observatory at Cerro Calan.
My assignment is developing an orthomode
transducer in digital. Normally, an orthomode
transducer is an element in a telescope that
enables the splitting of the polarization of the
incoming electromagnetic signal. However,
also in astronomy the trend is changing to
digital for more accurate measurements. So I
am working on implementing the transducer
on an FPGA board.
My weekends are used to explore the country.
Chile is as wide as the Netherlands but 5000
km long. In the far north you have the driest
desert in the world, which (as you travel
south) changes into a Mediterranean climate
and afterwards into a temperate climate.
In my first three months of my stay I have
explored the north of Chile with highlights
such as: Valle de Elqui, the Atacama desert
and Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia. The fourth and
fifth month are used to explore the middle
to near south, and in a month I have 3 weeks
of holiday. In that time I will travel to the far
south and go to the world famous landscapes
of Patagonia.
Thinking back to the first thought I had when
I arrived here, I think I now have an answer
to that. I did this because it is an once-ina-lifetime experience and one of the most
awesome and exciting things I have done so
far in my life!
December 2014| 25
IDepartment
Stella goes USA
By: Jirry Pons
Stella has found her way to many corners
of the world. Of course there was her first
great trip to Australia, where she won the
Cruiser Class of the World Solar Challenge.
Shortly after, Singapore was her next
stop and even when she was back home
Stella went on trips through Europe. To
Copenhagen, Hannover, and London,
all to show more people how real solar
mobility is. Last September, she visited
her fourth continent, North America. In
Detroit and in the Californian sunshine,
from Los Angeles to San Francisco, she
was turning heads on the roads and at
every stop.
Detroit: Motor City
O
n the 8th of September our trip
labelled “Stella goes USA” started
in Detroit, aka “Motor City”, at the
International Transport System World
Congress (ITS in short). The ITS is all about top
of the art high-tech innovations combined
with the latest technologies in the automotive industry. The future of automotive is
found here and of course that makes it a great
place to present Stella to the US public. The
Car-2-Car communication, developed by our
sponsors Cohda Wireless and NXP, was one of
the main features of Stella we were showing
of.
Onward to the golden Californian
sunshine
After a couple of days in Detroit the adventure
really got started. Two of our team members
drove a truck with Stella inside down the 4000
kilometre road leading to Los Angeles. When
our truckers arrived on the 15th of September,
we prepared her to get ready for a trip down
Highway One. This highway is the beautiful
coastal road that leads from Los Angeles to
San Francisco.
Car-2-Car communication
The beautiful scenic route down Highway One
A familiar, wonderful feeling
The next day it was time to really turn some
heads. We started off at Plugshare in Santa
Monica and on the first day we were driving
towards Paso Robles, the overnight stop
along the route to San Francisco. It all felt a bit
similar to the World Solar Challenge, driving in
convoy, using CB communication to communicate between cars, with the sunshine always
in our backs, but at the same time it also felt
like an amazing holiday, to take Stella out in
California.
Stella being a star on Highway
One
The scenic views down the road were amazing,
but the most amazing thing were the reactions we got from other drivers. People in
the cars next to Stella all were shocked and
astonished when they saw Stella, trying to
take pictures of her and even attempting to
take selfies with Stella in the background,
while smiling the whole time. The attention
Stella can communicate to the world via a new standard of Wi-Fi, developed for the automotive
industry. With this communication, complex problems like emissions, congestions, and safety
can be tackled. With this technology it could be possible to drive in convoy, to intervene
at near crashes, to give a warning when dangerous infrastructure conditions occur, and to
communicate with traffic lights. The possibilities are seemingly endless and several examples
of the technology could be experienced by participants through a ride in Stella at ITS.
26 | connecthor got even better at our first mid-day stop at the
Santa Barbara harbour where we lunched. It
was so cool to see how enthusiastic Americans
are about Stella. Once you get to tell them
our story they really support it on the fly. But
I guess the idea of a car that fuels itself by the
sun is pretty attractive to people living in such
a sunny state of America.
License and registration please?
One of my personal favourite moments of this
first day in California was when a police car
spotted us driving in a suburban area. At the
time I was sitting in Stella as a passenger and
I could see on our rear view system that the
police car started to follow us. When we hit a
traffic light, the officer of the law was creeping
forward in the lane next to us, inspecting
us very carefully. As I looked towards him
through the side window he didn’t seem
particularly amused, especially not by me
waving towards him. In the end he called in
our hard earned license plate number and
drove off, since Stella was neatly registered
in the US.
Arriving in lovely San Francisco
The rest of our trip went off without a hitch.
It still felt pretty insane to roll down a hill on
the highway with 120 kilometres per hour in
your self-made solar car. But the elevation of
the Californian roads never proved to be a
problem for Stella, not even the crazy steep
high way entrance we had to take right after
Department I
champion, but also a Guinness World Record
holder. After the parade lots of EV-fanatics
were really interested in Stella, which lead to
some nice talks and chats.
Inspiring young hearts while
feeling like a rock star
Stella in Detroit getting checked by the Michigan State Police
running into a red light. After a stop on the
pier of Santa Cruz, we finally arrived in the
Golden Gate Park, where we parked Stella
in front of a Dutch windmill, of all things
considered! We were welcomed in the residence of the consul general in San Francisco,
which concluded our amazing, beautiful and
exciting trip down Highway One.
Silicon Valley meets Stella
One of the biggest collections of some of
the largest technological companies, Silicon
Valley, was our next stop. In the showroom
of Tesla Motors, we met several battery and
power-train engineers, which were very interested in Stella. It was really nice to get some
in-depth technical questions from people
working on one of the most innovative cars
of this time. Our sponsor NXP also was a really
nice stop, where the employees of NXP got
to meet Stella, while enjoying some lovely
ice-cream in the hot sun. We ended the day
with meeting and eating with our colleagues
of Stanford University Solar Team. They got
a fourth place in the Challenger Class of the
World Solar Challenge and it was great to chat
with them and relive some of the adventures
we had down under, not even a year ago.
Setting a Guinness Book World
Record
Our quick visit to Silicon Valley was great, but
the Bay Area still had more to offer for Stella. In
Sacramento, the capitol of California, we got
to meet the EPA Secretary and other officials
from the State Capitol. Only a day later we
found ourselves in Cupertino to participate
in the largest parade of full-electric vehicles
ever. In total a whopping 507 vehicles entered
and Stella had the honour of being the fourth
vehicle that started in the parade. From this
moment on, Stella was not only a world
During our time in America we received
some very warm welcomes, but the warmest
welcome must have been that of the Rio
Linda Preparatory Academy. When we arrived
we already saw the Dutch flag the kids had
painted on the wall of their middle school
with a lovely figure of Stella on it. We all felt
so humble and grateful to be a part of Solar
Team Eindhoven in these moments. The
kids were so crazily excited to see Stella and
wanted to take pictures with us, give us hugs,
high fives and even receive our autographs!
It was insane, but mostly insanely wonderful.
We hope to have inspired some of these
kids to follow their dreams and who knows,
maybe, just maybe we have reached a couple
of future Stella builders!
Another trip to remember
Right now, as I’m writing this, Stella is in a
freight container being shipped back to
Eindhoven by boat. We are already home,
remembering this great trip we made. From
the business congress in Detroit, to the kids
we got to inspire in California, it has all been
really amazing. We also return even more
convinced than ever that electrical driving
is the future. Meeting with companies like
Tesla and all the EV-fanatics we met down the
road really solidified our believe in this. The
next step will be taking it solar and I believe
we have already convinced at least a small
portion of Americans of this.
Stella driving on the public road next to a school bus, her nickname given by competitors during the World Solar Challenge was The Magic
School Bus
December 2014| 27
IVaria
Hildebrandslied
C
ontrary to the wealth of Icelandic
stories still extant, there are almost
no Germanic myths and sagas from
continental Europe. One of the very few is the
Hildebrandslied, discovered in a German library
around 1715. The manuscript likely originates
from the monastery of Fulda in central Germany,
where in the 830s it was written down on two
empty pages of a theological codex. After its
rediscovery, the book eventually found its way
to the library of Kassel, where it was kept safe
for many years.
But alas, in World War II disaster struck. Many
of the US soldiers were little better than their
German counterparts and stole every bit of
art they could lay their hands on from their
rightful German owners. Such was the fate of
the Hildebrandslied. After a number of shady
antiquarians, it finally came into the possession
of the Office of Cultural Affairs in 1954 and was
returned to the Kassel library.
By: Fer Radstake
the manuscript, the same shady antiquarians
had tried to remove the stamp with a range of
chemicals (in the process irreparably damaging
the book). When that failed to work, they had
simply cut out the whole page. It wasn’t until
1972 that this last missing part was finally
found, in the archives of the “renowned”
Rosenbach Company.
As most Germanic poems, the Hildebrandslied
was written in alliterative verse (rhyme only
entered European poetry in the 12th century). As
I’ve sought to preserve this in my translation, I’ll
shortly describe the rules. Every line is composed
of two half-lines (here separated by the “/” character). At least one of the stressed syllables of the
first half-line has to alliterate with at least one
of the second half-line. Of the second half-line,
the first stressed syllable always has to alliterate.
The background of the story is the late 5th
century, when the Germanic Odoacer disposed
But where had the first page gone?
Ostrogothic fibula from Theoderic’s times
But where had the first page gone? This page
had contained the property stamp of the
library. In an attempt to disguise the origin of
First page of the Hildebrandslied
28 | connecthor of the last West Roman emperor and established the Kingdom of Italy, nominally as
vassal of the Eastern Roman empire. In practice however, he was entirely independent and
increasingly becoming a menace to emperor
Zeno. Meanwhile, the Ostrogoths were living
as “foederati” (allies) on Roman soil under
their recently appointed king Theoderic. They
too were becoming dangerous and rebellious,
so Zeno played the two nominal vassals out
against each other, and incited Theoderic to
conquer Italy and rule there as his viceroy. This
is where the poem starts, between 488 and 493,
at the onset of a great battle between the two
Germanic kings. As was customary in Germanic
culture, in each camp the strongest warrior was
dressing up for a man-to-man fight against the
enemy’s chosen...
I once was told, / that between two armies
Two heroes, / Hildebrand and Hadubrand,
Checked their gear, / girded their swords,
Put on their mailcoats / and their mighty armour,
When they went / towards the battlefield.
The elder Hildebrand, / Heribrand’s son,
Asked the younger, / “Of all world’s men,
Who’s your father, / and which is your family?
Name me one / and I know the others,
All nobles in this land / are known to me!”
Hadubrand answered: / “The old and wise
Who lived back then / told me that
Hildebrand’s my father’s name, / Hadubrand
is mine.
He left these lands / long ago,
Fled from Odoacer / in the army of Theoderic.
He left his son / and spouse at home
To fend for themselves / as he fled east.
As Theoderic’s grudge / against Odoacer grew
My father became the / friendless man’s1
favourite.
He always fought / at the front of the army,
He loved the battle, / brave men liked him.”
“God in heaven2,” / Hildebrand spoke,
“You’d never let combat / such next of kin!3”
He took off a beautiful / bracelet of gold,
Given to him / by the Hunnic4 king.
“In friendship I give / this golden ring!”
Varia I
Hadubrand, son / of Hildebrand, said:
“One should receive / these so-called gifts
With spear and sword, / and shield no less!
You try to trap me, / then throw your spear.
Only because / of your cunning you’re old.
Sailors who sailed / the southern seas,
Told me he fell / fighting the foe:
Hildebrand, son / of Heribrand’s dead!”
Hildebrand, son / of Heribrand, said:
“Your equipment shows / you serve a good king,
And weren’t forced / to flee like your father.
Alas, my Lord, / my life is tough.
Sixty winters / and summers5 I wandered
And in lands far away / I waged war.
I was killed / in no castle I conquered;
Now shall my son / strike me with his sword;
If I don’t kill him first, / I’ll fall by his blade!
From an elderly such as I, / you can easily win
The battle-gear, / if you’re bold enough,
And if you’ve got the right, / my riches you
can take.”
“No single hero,” / Hadubrand said,
“would walk from this fight / that you want
so fiercely.
Now let us start / and see who’ll lose
Not only his armour / but also his life;
The victor will keep / the fallen one’s treasure!”
Then they struck / with their sharpened spears,
But those got stuck / in their shields’ wood.
So they slashed / their swords with strength.
The heavy steel / hit their shields
Until the battered / boards broke,
Shattered by their weapons / […]
The mausoleum of Theoderic the Great in Ravenna
At the end of the second page, the text
suddenly breaks off leaving the eventual fate
of Hildebrand and Hadubrand uncertain. Both
the 14th century “Jüngeres Hildebrandslied”
and the 13th century “Þiðrekssaga” tell us a
story of eventual reconciliation. This happy
end however is most likely an alteration from
At the end of the second page,
the text suddenly breaks off
later times, suiting to the courtly audience of
the middle ages. The earlier Germanics would
have preferred a more tragic fate in which one
of the two dies. This is preserved in a few other
stories, where Hildebrand confesses to having
killed his own son. Below is a rendition of how
this original ending could have looked like.
Ostrogothic earrings
But as the father neared / the noble fighter,
the son struck / his sword with strength.
Hildebrand dodged / the daunting blow
and taunted his dying / treacherous child:
“You learned to fight / from a lass6,
and like a lass / you lost now!”
The heroes then fought / till Hadubrand fell,
Hurt by the weapon / wielded by
Hildebrand.
“Have my sword,” / Hadubrand said.
“You’re the winner, / I yield to you!
Then he sat / by his dying descendant,
And held his hand / as the heavy breathing
of his son / slowly ceased.
A tear fell / from his face
and he wept / with watery eyes:
“Oh Lord in heaven, / let this hero
peacefully rest / in your realm above!
Me awaits / merely woe:
I am cursed, / I killed my kin!”
Theoderic.
Although the story is purely Germanic in nature, both armies were highly Christianised in the 5th century.
3
Thereby asserting he is Hadubrand’s lost father!
4
The Ostrogoths had been vassals of the Huns from ca. 370 – 454.
5
60 seasons divided by 2 seasons a year equals 30 years.
6
Hadubrand’s mother, Hildebrand’s ex-wife. The treacherous blow and the taunt are preserved in the Jüngeres Hildebrandslied and Þiðrekssaga.
1
2
December 2014| 29
IPUZZLE
Puzzle
New puzzle
Objective / Rules
• You have to enter the letters A to Y in the grid.
Previous puzzle
The winner of the
previous puzzle is
Martijn van Eerdt.
• Every letter is next to its predecessor from the alphabet, either
horizontally, vertically or diagonally.
• The clues around the edge tell you which row, column or diagonal
each letter is in.
Please send your answer to connecthor@thor.edu before January 9.
30 | connecthor Varia I
Column: Mega satisfaction
By: Corine Spoor – Kolvenbag
A
t first instance, it seems straightforward: two departments move to a
new building. The people in the two
departments work in offices and laboratories, so the new building consists of offices
and laboratories. Pack everything at point A,
transport it to point B, unpack – ready. And
that’s where the ‘straightforward’ part of my
column for Connecthor ends.
The two departments are spread out over
eight buildings. Some groups are already
located at their permanent places in buildings
other than Flux, but still ‘A’ quickly becomes
‘A to E’. And those groups are all different.
Different people, different processes, different
atmosphere, different method of working,
size, etc. It is this difference that makes our
academic environment so interesting and
exciting. I agree entirely. But for a move like
this a blueprint that can be copied would be
really useful in some situations. Although
– the very fact that we have thought about
every room in Flux and worked together
to find the ideal solution makes Flux our
building.
It is common knowledge that Flux offers
fewer square meters than we are used to.
In the old situation, every group had found
a way of working which fitted the character
of the group and the people who make up
that group. All these methods of working
have been reinvented, or rather: they will be
reinvented in the coming months. The foundation for this has been worked out in the
Flux workshops and set out in the so-called
‘vlekkenplan’ or blueprint. This foundation is
often completely different to the old situation. Everyone thinking together ‘out of the
box’ was the key. Although Flux is smaller than
we have been used to, we have enabled the
building to breathe, for example by using the
space for PhD students creatively. In addition, we have managed to create around 5
places for masters’ students on every floor.
The masters’ students will have a place at the
centre of the research group. The departments and groups will keep their own character and identity in the great Flux entirety.
The creative solution is a tricky puzzle!
Most of us will be familiar with moving house
in our personal lives. Staring at an attic full
of junk, perspiring, taking a quick break.
Unbelievable what people collect and store!
Here at the TU/e there is not so much junk as
such, but that is compensated for by paper:
files, books, exams, dissertations, magazines,
reports etc. And this cannot be moved to
Flux, at least not in a physical form. So it has to
be digitalized! We have also implemented this
changeround. We have bundled forces, all
archives have been taken in hand and where
possible, have been digitalized. We are all set
for a digital future in Flux!
And then the labs. Office furniture and equipment is relatively easy to move, but the laboratories are a completely different matter. Very
expensive, large, heavy and fragile set-ups
have to be transported to Flux. Continuity is
crucial: if something goes wrong it can have
devastating consequences. Moving to Flux
cannot be done just by completing a checklist. It’s an exercise in precision! Every step
and every choice we make brings a new split
in the road. Do we turn left, right or carry
on straight ahead? Or perhaps a step backwards? The many aspects that we want to
deal with optimally form a puzzle that can
only be solved with creativity and mutual
agreement. It will succeed thanks to the
many colleagues from the groups and service
centres, who have put so much effort into the
Flux project. We’re almost there. And me? Just
seeing how this process is unfolding gives me
energy. For me, Flux is a mega job with mega
satisfaction!
December 2014| 31
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