Cool Mechatronic has developed a novel electro-mechanical controllable pitch propeller, fan, or turbine that will extend the use of Controllable Pitch Propeller (CPP) technology from large scale applications to small and medium applications where this technology is not presently commercially available. Currently, there is a gap in the utilization of CPP, as it is only found in heavy-duty applications such as airplane propellers, ships, and large industrial cooling fans. These applications adjust their blade pitch through hydraulic actuation, which is an expensive, complicated, and unreliable solution that comes with laborious maintenance concerns as a result of the required hydraulic fluid, seals, and reservoirs. Cool Mechatronics’ innovative technology seeks to address the modern markets' unmet need for an efficient, affordable, and low-maintenance controllable pitch technology in applications such as engine cooling fans. Every automobile and truck produced today employs variable speed fans with no pitch control due to limitations imposed by the complexities/inefficiencies of hydraulics, creating an enormous opportunity for innovation. Other markets untapped by CPP include small to medium industrial cooling fans, air conditioning fans, drones, turbines, and outboard motors. As it currently stands, the incorporation of hydraulic-based CPP technology would not be cost-effective or reliable enough to support these applications. Additionally, there is a market opportunity for machinery currently utilizing hydraulically actuated pitch control, such as airplane propellers, to be retrofitted with the proposed electro-mechanical actuation, resulting in an upgrade in the reliability of an antiquated method. The value proposition: A fan, propeller, or turbine operated under varying speed is inefficient unless the pitch of the application’s blades is varied with variations in speed. These inefficiencies are very much like driving a car down the highway stuck in first gear. To address this problem, hydraulic actuation has been the standard in CPP technology in the marine and aerospace sectors for nearly 100 years. Unlike current commercially available CPP for large-scale applications, Cool Mechatronics’ electro-magnetic approach to CPP is intended to: (1) improve efficiency 2-3 fold through the elimination of hydraulic pressure losses, (2) eliminate cumbersome maintenance requirements common with hydraulics-based systems by limiting the number of moveable parts and seals, and (3) provide a cost-effective alternative through an innovative design that is scalable and easy to manufacture. This will, for the first time, allow for the incorporation of controllable pitch technology into a drastically wider variety of previously unrealized applications that will not only provide much-needed improvement to the engine-cooling-fan market but also increase efficiency and performance throughout a range of sectors and industries. In light of increasingly stringent fuel and resource efficiency requirements across virtually every industry, it is evident that the use of current bulky and inefficient hydraulics-based systems is no longer tenable. Only heavy construction machinery currently benefits from CPP technology for cooling, and companies offering such technology for heavy construction machinery claim a 75% reduction in the fan’s power draw with additional significant fuel savings for its applications [1]. These benefits are true for the vast majority of industrial, commercial, and consumer fan applications. The potential for market disruption does not stop there, the free market has yet to create a solution that can manipulate the pitch of a turbine’s blades – realizing possible untapped improvements in fuel efficiency of 15%, which might be critical for military flight [2] [3].

Controllable pitch turbines have the potential to, for the first time, make a turbofan engine possible for automotive applications (making piston engines obsolete). This shortage is rectified with the simple, yet innovative technology proposed in this application. The innovation: The CPP technology proposed by Cool Mechatronics’ patented approach underscores its innovation through the simplicity of its design which allows substantial gains in efficiency (2-3 fold gain), reduced maintenance requirements (up to 3 times as reliable), weight reduction, and reduced manufacturing costs [4]. This makes this novel solution exceptionally appealing when compared to industry-

standard hydraulics-based systems. At the core of the innovation is the incorporation of electric linear actuation cylinders that replace the hydraulic actuation. This is done by replacing hydraulic pistons with electric-spindle-like technology, resulting in a significant efficiency increase. Electric spindles consist of a rod with a helical thread and a nut secured using the helical thread. Either the nut or the rod can be spun to generate linear motion. The proposed electro-mechanical controllable pitch solution will incorporate this thread-and-nut combination in the shaft of a rotating fan, propeller, or turbine, all while innovating on this existing technology by spinning the nut with electromagnets on the stator system. The force generated by the resulting axial motion is then used to control the pitch, in a similar way as by the axial force from a hydraulic piston. Thus, the result is an apparatus that is powerful enough to incorporate into machinery like aeronautic propellers that presently use hydraulics-based CPP technology, yet its simplicity is suitable to the cost sensitivities of the automotive cooling fan industry.