INNAS NEWS

Innas at the BAUMA München, April 7 - 13, 2025

Innas will be present at the BAUMA exhibition which will be held from April 7th until April 13th in Munich, Germany.

The Innas team will be present to listen to your ideas and demands to power your future mobile machinery. We of course also would like to get you leveled on our developments to increase productivity and efficiency of hydraulic mobile equipment.

Important themes at the Innas booth will be the latest developments on the Common Pressure Rail and the Hydraulic Transformers. This technology was sucessfully tested in a wheel loader and we are open for more field test partners.
We further improved the Floating cup technology for pumps and motors. We managed to further increase the rotational speed of the pump to match the wide speed range of electric motors.

We look forward to see you! BAUMA, Munich - Hall A3 booth 503!

New Hydraulic Transformer papers presented at the IFK Dresden - March 2024

At the 14th IFK in Dresden Germany, Innas presented 2 new papers on the Hydraulic Transformer.

Peter Achten presented his paper "Fundamentals of hydraulic transformers”. The paper describes the design options to come to an efficient hydraulic transformer, and can be downloaded here. In his presentation Peter also addressed the importance of innovation for the hydraulic industry.

Robin Mommers introduced his latest paper on the FCT80 Hydraulic Transformer. The paper and presentation define how the efficiency of hydraulic transformers can be measured. Furthermore the first test results of the FCT80 prototype were presented. Click here to download the paper. The slides of his presentation can be foud here.

Hydraulic pump speed to the max by counteracting centrifugal forces

Electric motors used in electro-hydraulic actuators can run much faster than the hydraulic pumps to which they are connected, which limits the power density. It would be great if the maximum pump speed could be increased considerably. The limiting factor of hydraulic pump speed lies in the centrifugal forces. Although Floating Cup pumps can already operate at much higher speeds compared to conventional piston pumps, a recent break-through has increased the speed even more with the use of so-called counterweights. This novel solution has been presented by Sef Achten at the ASME Fluid Power and Motion Control Symposium in October 2023 in Sarasota, Florida. The paper describes the solution in detail and can be downloaded here.

New Hydraulic Transformer Design presented at SICFP Tampere Finland, May 2023

At the Scandinavian International Conference on Fluid Power, held in Tampere Finland, Innas showed its’ new design of a Hydraulic Transformer, the FCT80. The design is based on the Floating Cup technology, allowing a high efficiency and power density. Transformers allow for a far simpler system architecture, the Common Pressure Rail, comparable with the electricity grid. It enables hydraulic systems to reach considerably higher efficiencies and lower CO2 emissions. The higher efficiency of the hydraulic system allows for much longer battery life in machines that are electrified. The paper in which the new FCT80 design is explained, can be downloaded here. The presentation on YouTube is available here.

Innas presentations at the IFK Aachen, June 2022

At the 13th IFK in Aachen, Peter Achten presented new experimental test results of the Shuttles technology for pumps and motors. Shuttles allow to improve hydraulic pump efficiency by strongly reducing commutation losses. In the paper, the results of adding shuttles to a representative slipper type pump are presented. The peak efficiency increased from 91,9 to 96,4%. The average overall efficiency has increased from 90,8% to 94,3%. The slides of the presentation are available here.

Robin Mommers presented his paper on the modern high-volume manufacturing of pistons and cups, which was developed in cooperation with the ART group specialists in automotive manufacturing. The core elements, pistons and cups, were produced by means of deep-drawing and stamping and were successfully tested in a Floating Cup pump. The modern manufacturing allows for considerable cost reduction compared to traditional machined components.

Hard to beat - Floating Cup Efficiency

We keep on improving the floating cup principle. Floating cup pumps can now achieve efficiencies up to 97%. In a range between 500 and 3500 rpm, and between 100 and 400 bar, the average efficiency is 95%. Moreover, this pump can be operated in a much larger speed and pressure range than any other pump in the market. Unlike all other pumps, this pump has no limiting minimum speed. It can be operated starting from standstill, hardly without any torque loss. In addition, the pump can also be operated at very high rotational speeds of up to 5000 rpm. The measurements were performed on our 45cc FC pump and according to the method described in this paper. Feel free to contact us for further details.

Best paper award at the ASME/BATH symposium 2021

We are proud to announce that the Global Fluid Power Society awarded Innas' paper on Commutation loss in hydraulic pumps and motors as best paper of the symposium.
Commutation losses can cause up to one third of the losses in hydraulic machines and are therefore important to avoid. The paper provides a method to predict these losses in a pump or motor. It was written by Robin Mommers, Peter Achten, Jasper Achten en Jeroen Potma, and can be downloaded here.
Also available is a video of the ASME/Bath presentation in which Robin Mommers explains how commutations works in a hydraulic pump and how it impacts the efficiency. The presentation can be viewed on here on Youtube.

Shuttles technology explained at the ASME/BATH symposium 2021

Following Robin Mommers presentation on commutation losses, Peter Achten presented a paper explaining the Shuttle technology. Shuttles can improve pumps and motors in terms of increasing efficiency and lowering noise.

Also this presentation is available on video. It explains the fundamentals in only 12 minutes, and can be watched on our Youtube channel by clicking here.

Pistons and Cups redesigned for cost reduction

Like any piston pump type also Floating Cup pumps get more expensive when high pressures (500 bar) have to be met. But most pumps are used for pressures below, or up to 350 bar, and speeds below 4000 rpm.

In this range, Floating cup already offered best-in-class performance in terms of efficiency, low noise and low pulsations, and starting torque.

As this <350 bar power range is most popular, we decided to focus on further cost reduction. In close cooperation with the ART group, specialists in high-precision automotive manufacturing, we redesigned the pistons en cups. The core elements can now be made from sheet metal by means of deep-drawing and stamping.

New report on benchmarks tests - efficiency of hydraulic pumps & motors

In 2019 a new approach for measuring the losses of hydraulic pumps was proposed together with an international group of leading fluid power experts. Following this approach, we started a process of benchmark tests in which representative hydraulic machines are compared under equal circumstances, and avoiding the inconsistencies of ISO 4409.

The results of these benchmark tests are now presented in an extensive report and are covering pumps and motors from several leading pump manufacturers. The full report can be downloaded here.