ryu289 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 23, 2020 8:18 pm
Ok, first off...huh? Can you go into more detail about this rotary actuator?
... really? It's a really basic concept in mechanical engineering. It's just a machine that turns something. They come in all different types, driven by electric motors, mechanical transmission of power from other moving parts, pneumatically, hydraulically, using vacuum pressure, etc. As long as it uses some kind of transmission of energy to rotate something, it's a rotary actuator.
The yellow Kinetrol pneumatic actuators that provide motive power for so many wildly dangerous MythBusters devices are a good example of industrial-grade rotary actuators.
The single-axis motors in most of the joints of a typical mobile suit are rotary actuators by definition, albeit driven by an unusual/exotic method that amounts to nuclear-powered pulsed-power hydraulics.
ryu289 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 23, 2020 8:18 pm
And two, where can I read this Master Archive? Is it translated? Would I need to buy it?
Master Archive Mobile Suit is a series of technical publications for
Mobile Suit Gundam's Universal Century published by SoftBank Creative, in cooperation with GAGraphic. There's ten or so books in the series now, AFAIK, that each cover the history and capabilities of one particular model of Mobile Suit or specific family of Mobile Suit like the RX-78 series, GP series, Zeta Gundam, Unicorn Gundam, Sinanju, Zaku II, GM I, GM II, and GM II, Nu Gundam, and the Victory Gundam. The same publisher also has several other series in the style, most titled
Master File, including eleven books for
Macross mecha, and ones for
Ace Combat: Assault Horizon,
Vifam,
Dougram, and
Dragonar.
As far as I know, it has not been translated into English. It's pretty easy to get through Mandarake and various other Japanese specialty bookstores, Amazon, and occasionally eBay.