1MILLIKELVIN

1MILLIKELVIN is an Australian company that makes stress imaging camera systems. Its cameras show mechanical stress on structures as they are loaded. Engineers and researchers use them to test structures and to check digital models.

The main product is the LTS-640V, which the company describes as the first dedicated stress imaging camera. It is compact and rugged, and it makes detailed stress maps in real time. The company also sells the MiTE Suite. The system uses thermoelastic stress analysis, which detects very small changes in temperature.

The technology grew out of work with Australia's Department of Defence. It was built to deal with unexpected fatigue failures that show up years later in testing or in service. Older methods often could not check digital simulations well enough. Stress imaging lets engineers see stress from the start and improve their models.

The company says its approach uses uncooled microbolometer sensors, not costly science-grade detectors. This makes the system easier to use, tougher, smaller and cheaper. It reached a thermal resolution below one millikelvin, and the company took its name from that result.

The technology has been used for more than a decade to study fatigue on aircraft test articles. These include the F/A-18, F-111, C-130J and F-35. Early prototypes were small enough to sit directly on a highly loaded structure, such as an F/A-18 centre barrel, which opened up areas that were once off limits.

The company started in 2018 to commercialise the MiTE technology. It showed its first product demonstrator in 2019 and revealed the LTS-640V at the Singapore Airshow in 2022. In 2023 it won the National and SME Innovation Awards at the Avalon Airshow in Melbourne.

Customers work in aerospace and defence, materials testing, research and development, advanced manufacturing, automotive, civil engineering and renewables. Dantec Dynamics is an official reseller of the cameras.

Services

• Stress imaging cameras
• LTS-640V
• MiTE Suite
• Thermoelastic stress analysis
• Technical support