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The current study has concentrated on discovering and developing clean alternative energy sources like biodiesel and employing novel methods to reduce harmful emissions and enhance engine performance behavior. The consumption of biodiesel in diesel engines reduces the emissions from the tailpipe, but some researchers claim that it actually produces more NOx pollution than engines that run on regular diesel, which limits the use of biodiesel. In this study, Ricinus communis biodiesel was generated through transesterification process, and its fuel properties were assessed. The employ of biodiesel in diesel engines minimize exhaust emissions; however, multiple investigators claim that the consumption of biodiesel generates greater amounts of nitrogen oxide pollutants than diesel-fueled engines, which limits the possibility of biodiesel usage.

Quality assurance (QA) in motor vehicle emissions inspection/maintenance (I/M) programs is a continuing concern, especially in decentralized programs with hundreds or even thousands of licensed stations. The emissions analyzers used in such stations are an important focus of governmental QA efforts because of the central role of analyzers in determining which vehicles need to be repaired. Therefore, the In-use performance of I/M emission analyzers has a large impact on the quality of 1/M programs as a whole. This paper reports on the results of an investigation in California designed to determine in-use performance of emission analyzers in the field. The investigation was designed to evaluate both drift rates and the ability of analyzer systems with automatic gas calibration capability to correct analyzer responses outside of accepted tolerances.

The Focke-Wulf Fw 190 was one of the truly outstanding fighter aircraft of the Second World War. It distinguished itself over all fronts on which the Luftwaffe fought in conditions ranging from arctic wastes to the deserts of North Africa. The Fw 190 represented the epitome of conventional piston-engine fighter design on the threshold of the jet age. Conceived nearly sixty years ago, flying for the first time on the eve of the war in 1939 and acknowledged as “the best all-around fighter in the world” in the mid-war years, derivatives of the Fw 190 were still pushing the ultimate capability boundary for this class of aircraft at war's end in 1945 (reaching maximum level true airspeeds of 470 mph [about Mach 0.7] at altitudes of well over 40,000 feet). This paper assesses the design attributes and technology approaches, including innovative use of advanced electrical systems, that were used to make the Fw 190 one of the great all-around fighters in aviation history.

This paper is an extension of our previous work on the CHASE (Classification by Holistic Analysis of Scene Environment) algorithm, that automatically classifies the driving complexity of a road scene image during day-time conditions and assigns it an ‘Ease of Driving’ (EoD) score. At night, apart from traffic variations and road type conditions, illumination changes are a major predominant factor that affect the road visibility and the driving easiness. In order to resolve the problem of analyzing the driving complexity of roads at night, a brightness detection module is incorporated in our end-to-end nighttime EoD system, which computes the ‘brightness factor’ (bright or dark) for that given night-time road scene. The brightness factor along with a multi-level machine learning classifier is then used to classify the EoD score for a night-time road scene. Our end-to-end ‘Night-time EoD system’ is a real-time onboard system implemented and tested on road scene data collected in Japan.

Design of a Cabin Tilting System of heavy trucks, a multi degree of freedom mechanism, is a challenge. Factors like adequate tilting angle, cabin styling, packaging, non interference of tilting system with ride comfort, forces in the system, specifications of the hydraulic system, are all very important for designing the system. Numerous considerations make the design process highly iterative hence longer design time. This paper primarily focuses on Kinematics and Dynamic analysis of the system in ADAMS and validation of system with real time testing results. Intention of this work is to make a parametric ADAMS model and link it to a Knowledge Based Engineering application to facilitate designer to quickly carry out design iterations for reducing development time. The Knowledge Based Engineering software is made using object oriented language called ‘Object Definition Language’ which has been developed using C and C++ software languages.

Due to the rising costs of fuel and increasingly stringent regulations, auto makers are in need of technology to enable more fuel-efficient powertrain technologies to be introduced to the marketplace. Such powertrains must not sacrifice performance, safety or driver comfort. Today's engine and powertrain manufacturers must, therefore, do more with less by achieving acceptable vehicle performance while reducing fuel consumption. One effective method to achieve this is the extreme downsizing of current direct injection spark ignited (DISI) engines through the use of high levels of boosting and cooled exhaust gas recirculation (EGR). Key challenges to highly downsized gasoline engines are retarded combustion to prevent engine knocking and the necessity to operate at air/fuel ratios that are significantly richer than the stoichiometric ratio.

“Digital Prototype” simulations have been used at DaimlerChrysler to achieve vehicle level NVH objectives. The effectiveness of these simulations to guide the design when faced with vehicle parameter uncertainties is discussed. These uncertainties include, but are not limited to, material properties, material gauges, damping, structural geometry, loads, boundary conditions and weld integrity. Manufacturing and assembly processes introduce variations in the nominal values of these parameters resulting in a scatter of vehicle level NVH simulation responses. An example of a high frequency NVH concern will be studied and modified to arrive at robust design guidance when faced with uncertainty. The validity of a “deterministic digital prototype” simulation model and its relevant role as a “trend predictor” rather than “absolute predictor” tool in guiding the design is also discussed.

This paper, confined to the application of hard chrome plated liners to high-speed four-stroke diesel and gasoline engines, illustrates the increase in their popularity in the United Kingdom, and the advanced production methods which make this economically possible. The need for balanced engine life has long been apparent and is even more important today, the growth of motor transport having outstripped repair facilities. Iron bore life has been surpassed by improvement in the life of other component parts in the modern diesel engine. The provision of hard chrome plated liners can restore the balance. Further development and turbocharging of diesel engines has shown the need for a bore material capable of preventing scuffing and galling at elevated temperatures. Hard chrome has already proved itself in four-stroke engines under these conditions.

The Boeing Company in Mesa, Arizona, has been conducting a concept design study of a roadable helicopter called the “Converticar” to assess its feasibility. This is a twin-engine vehicle with twin retractable coaxial counter-rotating rotors. The purpose of the study is to describe a vehicle that carries four passengers in the equivalent of a luxury car that also can fly like a helicopter, and can be priced like a luxury car. To come near this cost goal, the production rate must be on the order of 500,000 units a year. At that rate there is no chance of training a comparable number of pilots each year. So the machine must fly and navigate autonomously, with the pilot just dialing in where he/she wants to go. Technologically, the concept appears to be feasible. Modern design processes, new materials, and improved manufacturing process should allow the Converticar to be built at the prescribed rate when the proper infrastructure for manufacturing it is made available.

Ammonia is one of the most useful compounds that react with NOx selectively on a catalyst, such as V2O5-TiO2, under oxygen containing exhaust gas. However ammonia cannot be stored because of its toxicity for the small power generator in populated areas or for the diesel vehicles. A new concept for NOx reduction in diesel engine using ammonia is introduced. This system is constructed from the hydrogen generator by fuel reformer, the ammonia synthesizer, SCR catalyst for NOx reduction and the gas injection system of reformed gas into the cylinder. Experimental results show that, the SCR catalyst provides a very high rate of NOx reduction, reformed gas injection into cylinder is very effective for particulate reduction. WHEN CONSIDERING INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINES of the 1990's the question of how to harmonize the engine with the natural environments is one of the greatest problems. The internal combustion engine changes a substance into energy via its explosive combustion.

The objective of the development of the aerodynamic drag predictive tool CDaero was for use as a module for the Automobile Design Support System (AutoDSS). CDaero is an empirically based drag coefficient predictive tool based initially on the MIRA (Motor Industry Research Association) algorithm. The development philosophy was to be able to predict the aerodynamic drag coefficient of an automobile with knowledge of the features of the surface geometry control curves. These are the curves that control the 3-dimensional geometry as seen in the profile, plan and front and rear views. CDaero has been developed in a computing environment using the equation solver TKSolver™. Fifty-one input feature values are first determined from the automobile geometry and then entered into the program. CDaero models the drag coefficient with thirteen different components covering the basic body, as well as additional components such as the wheels, mud flaps, etc.

In one of the fatigue tests for wet friction materials, “bump test”, an inertia-type rig equipped with a multi-disk assembly is used. One of the steel disks in the assembly has radial bumps for the purpose of creating high local contact pressure and high temperature. Due to the severe contact conditions, a comparative testing for different friction materials can be conducted within a relatively small number of cycles. In the paper, a design of a “bump” assembly used for automotive wet friction materials is described. Based on both experimental tests and advanced contact modeling, non-uniform contact pressure generated by the bumps and resulting temperature are estimated. The computational model is used then to study the influence of the modulus of elasticity of the friction material and reaction plate thickness on the contact conditions. The bump fatigue tests lead ultimately to material failure.

Powertrain electrification is becoming increasingly common in the transportation sector to address the challenges of global warming and deteriorating air quality. This paper introduces a novel “Build Your Hybrid” approach to experience and test various hybrid powertrain concepts. This approach is applied to the light commercial vehicles (LCV) segment due to the attractive combination of a Diesel engine and a partly electrified powertrain. For this purpose, a demonstrator vehicle has been set up with a flexible P02 hybrid topology and a prototype Hybrid Control Unit (HCU). Based on user input, the HCU software modifies the control functions and simulation models to emulate different sub-topologies and levels of hybridization in the demonstrator vehicle. Three powertrain concepts are considered for LCVs: HV P2, 48V P2 and 48V P0 hybrid. Dedicated hybrid control strategies are developed to take full advantage of the synergies of the electrical system and reduce CO2 and NOx emissions.

In today’s Automotive world, there is NO need to advocate “Light weighting”. Government policies for carbon footprint reduction combined with high safety standards are driving OEMs to adopt advanced manufacturing technologies. Steel hot forming is selected as most preferred way to reduce weight as it is easy to adopt and commercially known. It had many advantages compare to conventional cold stamping of standard and high tensile steel. The process consists of heating blank to nearly 1000 °C and quenching it in tool to for martensitic structure. Higher strength up to 2000 MPa can be achieved by this process. There are many examples where part weight is reduced by 15 to 20 % by this method. But Steel hot forming has limitation as specific density of steel is still high. Thus, there is limitation to its weight reduction capability. For further reduction, OEMs have started exploring Aluminium hot forming.

As a part of testing the braking performance of motorcycles, the method designed for evaluating the very changes caused in brake characteristics due to heat fade has been recently receiving the close attention of ISO and ECE. With the cooperation of the members of the Motorcycle Brake Subcommittee of Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association we measured temperature changes in the brakes and braking force distribution in motorcycles being driven downhill, based on which we find simple and highly reliable simulation test methods on a flat test course. As for test method, we found the STOP method of repeated starting and stopping more suitable to motorcycles than the SNUB, method of making non-stop running. For both methods we also found test conditions offering the highest correlation to actual down-hill driving.

The method of flame ionization was used for measuring total hydrocarbons in both single-cylinder and multicylinder 4-cycle, direct injection diesel engine exhaust. Use of the emission parameters of hydrocarbon concentration, per cent unburned fuel, specific hydrocarbon rate, mass of hydrocarbons per million cycles, mass of hydrocarbons per mile, and mass of hydrocarbons per ton-mile are discussed. The basic approach used in the flame ionization detector is shown. The hydrocarbon sample was transferred from the exhaust system through a heated sample line and oven operating at 375 F. The sample line was aspirated to reduce the sample residence time to 2 sec. The effect various sampling locations have on hydrocarbon measurements from a single-cylinder engine is shown and discussed. The effects of load, speed, and injection timing on hydrocarbon emission data are shown for a single-cylinder engine.

Problems of bore distortion, combustion blowby and gasket fatigue in lightweight engine blocks are ultimately related to the gasket sealing pressure distribution. For both conventional embossed steel gaskets and composite ones this distribution can be modified by suitable local changes in gasket stiffness. Current methods of gasket optimization concentrate on large scale iterative finite element analysis of the head/gasket/block system, with major computational costs. We present a more economical alternative in which condensed compliance matrices are obtained either from elementary NASTRAN runs or by experimental means. The algorithm enables the gasket engineer to ‘tune’ the gasket to the desired sealing pressure profile with acceptable stiffness variations.