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The three major challenges in the power electronics in hybrid and electric vehicles are: System cost, power density and reliability. High temperature power device and packaging technologies increases the power density and reliability while reducing system cost. Advanced Silicon devices with synthesized high-temperature packaging technologies can achieve junction temperature as high as 200C (compared to the present limitation of 150C) eliminating the need for a low-temperature radiator and therefore these devices reduces the system cost. The silicon area needed for a power inverter with high junction temperature capability can be reduced by more than 50 - 75% thereby significantly reducing the packaging space and power device and package cost. Smaller packaging space is highly desired since multiple vehicle platforms can share the same design and therefore reducing the cost further due to economies of scale.

Plug In Charging Systems are mainly responsible for transferring energy from the electric power grid into one or more vehicle energy storage devices (e.g. batteries). A satisfactorily operating Plug in Charging System has the following three key performance characteristics. First, the charge process starts up easily. Second, it completes the charge process within some expected time. Third, it charges efficiently so that excessive amounts of power are not wasted. When a Plug In Charging System malfunction exists and negatively affects one or more of these key performance criteria, it is the responsibility of the OBD monitoring system to identify the fault and notify the customer. The presentation will discuss the key performance characteristics described above and some of the diagnostic strategies used to detect faults. The discussion will also include an overview of MIL illumination and freeze frame storage capabilities.

With the increased demand for high volume, cost-effective, fiber-reinforced thermoplastic parts, the lack of high throughput systems has become more pronounced. Thermoforming as a method to generate complex shapes from a flat preform is dependable and fast. In order to use readily available, standard unidirectional impregnated thermoplastic tape in this process, a flat perform must be created prior to the thermoforming step. Formerly, creating the preform by hand layup was a time consuming and therefore costly, step. Fiberforge�?s patented RELAY� technology overcomes the challenges of handling thermoplastic prepreg tape and provides a solution through the automated creation of a flat preform, referred to as a Tailored Blank?. Producing a part for thermoforming with accurate ply orientation and scrap minimization is now as simple as loading a material spool followed by a pressing a start button. Presenter Christina McClard, Fiberforge

Presented by: Dan Ott Web Industries Director, Business Development, Advanced Composites Market With the growth of Fiber Placement technology as a preferred automation technology in aerospace manufacturing and the rapid growth of new production line installations, it is crucial to provide material in a form which meets all necessary specifications and supports the optimum productivity available from this major capital investment made by the producer of the parts. Achieving these goals happnes when the part designer, AFP machine builder, and the slit tape producer design the best process and format which provides smooth, efficient and rapid delivery of the prepreg slit tape to the Fiber Placement laydown head. Tape size (width), slit width tolerance, spool shape and size, density of prepreg on the spool, spool change-over and handling processes all play a factor in productivity, and creating (or inhibiting) the best ROI on a full-scale AFP production line.

NEARLY all steel used in this process of manufacturing frames comes to the plant in the form of strips, which are rolled to remove curvature and inspected automatically for dimensions. All operations and handling are automatic, except pickling, cleaning and oiling the stock and inspecting the assembled frame, until the enameled frame is ready to be shipped. Economical use of the strip steel is dependent upon an offsetting operation that makes the strip conform to the vertical curves desired in the finished frame. With the aid of illustrations, the author follows the fabricating process through the various lines and other units, until a frame is ready for shipment or storage, within less than 2 hr. after it enters the manufacturing line as strip steel.

CONVEYORS and handling systems often are planned and installed after a building is erected. The Pontiac plant, described in this paper, is an exception because it was designed without limitations as to space and for a definite production program. With the aid of photographs and floor plans on which the positions from which the photographs were taken are indicated, the complete production line of the plant is shown in detail. The order of assembly and the points at which various units are applied to the chassis are shown; also the locations of the storage spaces for many of the parts and the provisions for transporting them to the assembly line. Among the striking features of the chassis-assembly line is a hump, midway of the length of the building, which raises the chassis to the mezzanine level to allow passage underneath.

AFTER defining the function of transport as the transfer of persons and things from one part of the earth's surface to another in the minimum time and at the minimum cost, and dividing modern transport into human, animal and mechanical, the author proceeds to describe the part played by commercial motor-vehicles in the Country's economic structure. Since food and drink are necessities of life, the first examples of motor-truck transportation discussed include the haulage of milk, bakery products, livestock, produce, vegetables and fruit. These are followed by the use of the motor-truck in local and long-distance general hauling, retail delivery service of dry-goods and chain-store supplies, the oil industry and for the transportation of express matter. A section follows on the use made of this form of transportation by public utilities and municipalities.

AFTER defining the meaning of store-door delivery and outlining its history in Canada, the author reviews in detail the functions of the cartage agent and the railroad company under that system, and gives an idea of the territory and population served. Operation of Canadian store-door delivery is fully described, both as to the terminal facilities and the methods of handling, recording and checking outbound and inbound freight shipments. The author shows that in eastern Canada more than 97 per cent of the carted inbound tonnage is delivered to consignees by the end of the day following its receipt at the railroad sheds. Cartage tariffs used in Canadian store-door delivery are given and the legal situation involved in the operation of cartage service by railroads is outlined.

PROVIDING ample stock to guard against the possibility of the interruption of production for lack of material was the chief aim of inventory control in 1920. Recognition of the importance of turnover is one of several factors that have led to a study of minimum stocks. Inventories received first consideration in the now well-established financial-control policies of the General Motors Corp. Formerly, placing orders for materials far in advance of needs had been thought necessary to assure the supply, but restricting orders to suppliers to three months in advance has been satisfactory for 10 years. Each car division of the Corporation now submits a definite monthly forecast, based on 10-day reports from dealers of stocks and actual and estimated sales, which estimates the number of cars to be sold by the dealers, delivered to the dealers and manufactured during the current and three forward months.

To install conveyors in a going automobile manufacturing plant of moderate size, without interrupting production, and with a minimum amount of rearrangement of the plant and an investment commensurate with the saving to be effected, was the problem, the solution of which is herein described. The conditions that determined whether power-driven or gravity-actuated conveyors should be used are discussed and the various types required for handling raw stock, for machining operations, for sub-assemblies and for finished assemblies are indicated.

The paper is a presentation of a practical solution for the coordination of military and commercial transport with rail and water transport. The necessity for combining and coordinating transportation facilities with the idea of organizing a homogeneous transportation network of waterways, railways and highways, proved to be the essence of success in military operations during the World War. The utter inadequacy of pre-war and war-time transport facilities, when organized in the separate fields of railroad, maritime shipping and port operations, and the decentralized elements of highway transport, caused the United States Army to make a comprehensive study and plan of the world's war-time transportation with particular attention to the organization of motor transport as the necessary factor in coordinating all transportation facilities. The salient features and general principles of this study and the resultant plan are stated.

The author discusses the factors that must be considered in solving the transportation problems and then describes the operation of the English-railway cartage-system in some detail under the two main divisions of delivery and collection. An important feature of the system is that of the control afforded by locating a controller, or dispatcher, in a central office and holding him responsible for the movements of the carmen, or drivers. The details of this control are explained. The field for the motor truck in railway-terminal service is outlined and a presentation is made of the merits and demerits of unit containers, together with an illustrated description of the English “fiats,” or demountable bodies. Other subjects treated include cartage costs, tonnage hauled, unified control of cartage and expressions of opinion quoted from numerous English trade organizations.

This paper is confined to a discussion of machine-shop operations, and is intended to indicate by a few examples certain important economies that might be introduced in the shops of the automotive industry. It deals chiefly with the economies that can be effected without much capital outlay, though others are also mentioned. Calling attention particularly to the fact that, in the past, improvements of methods and of equipment have been confined largely to the more important operations on the more important parts and that relatively little study has been made of the smaller pieces and the less important operations, emphasis is placed on the necessity for carefully determining which tools and which makes of tool will best serve the purposes for which they are intended and for carefully sharpening the tools and providing means of setting them accurately.

THE design of the modern multi-story urban garage, commonly built of reinforced concrete, is based largely on arrangements for the vertical movement of individual cars at higher speed than prevailed in the garages of the older types, or the vertical movement of a greater number of cars at the same speed, according to the author. Basic considerations affecting the design are location, type of district, capacity, and method of vertical movement. Location on a main thoroughfare is advocated. The location in several typical districts, such as retail-shopping, office-building, hotel and club, theater and amusement, and middle or high-class residential, are discussed in connection with the several classes of patronage and their bearing on design and equipment.

The importance of analyzing operations to be performed on a given production job; determining how it can be done best, most quickly and most economically; and adapting standard machines or designing and building special machines for doing the work does not seem to be generally appreciated. Such preliminary work often results in large savings of time in production work, of floor space occupied by the machinery, of scrap losses, and usually in improvement of the quality of the work performed. If it is necessary to develop a new machine for a given purpose the savings effected will often pay for the machine in the first year of its use. The customer should pay all the cost of this development work because very often the special machine is suitable for use by only one customer and on only one production piece and the machine-tool designer and builder cannot recover any losses by building and selling duplicate machines.

The paper represents a study of analyses obtained from 656 samples of contaminated crankcase-oil and states the results of cooperative research, the sponsors being the Society, the American Petroleum Institute, the National Automobile Chamber of Commerce, and the Bureau of Standards. Reliable information was sought regarding existent conditions throughout the Country and, since analyses of a large number of samples were a requisite, arrangements were made with service stations located at points representative of the Country's atmospheric and geographical conditions for the collection of samples of contaminated crankcase-oil, a uniform procedure calculated to assure accuracy of the results being enjoined. Each participating service station was requested to select 10 cars, all of the same make, to drain the oil and to refill with new oil.

The title of this paper fully indicates its scope. The author presents an intimate picture of conditions prevailing at the war front which affect the operation and maintenance of war trucks, and these two factors in turn indicate the trend that design should take. The training of the mechanical transport personnel of the Army is also gone into at some length. The English and American trucks used earlier in the war consisted of about nineteen different makes and forty-two totally different models, resulting in a very serious problem of providing spare parts and maintenance in general. In the British Army transportation comes under an Army Service Corps officer called the Director of Transport and Supplies. At the outbreak of the war these officers had had little mechanical experience, horses being employed principally. In the French Army motor vehicles were used to a greater extent before the war, under the artillery command.