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This paper describes a joint SAE automotive and aerospace Recommended Practice SAE J3168 now in development to standardize a process for Reliability Physics Analysis. This is a science-based approach to implement Physics-of-Failure research in conducting durability simulations in a Computer Aided Engineering Environment. It is used to calculate failure mechanism susceptibilities and estimate the likelihood of failure and the expected durability life of Electrical, Electronic and Electromechanical components and equipment, due to stresses such as mechanical shock, vibration, temperature cycling, etc. Reliability Physics Analysis is based on the material science principle of stress driven damage accumulation in materials. The process enables the identification of potential failure risks early in the design phase so that such risks can be designed out in order to efficiently design high reliable and robustness into electronic products.

The numerical simulation of ice melting process on an iced helicopter rotor blade is presented. The ice melting model uses an enthalpy-porosity formulation, and treats the liquid-solid mushy zone as a porous zone with porosity equal to the liquid fraction. The ice shape on the blade section is obtained by the icing code with a dynamic mesh module. Both of the temperature change and the ice-melting process on the rotor blade section surface are analyzed. The phenomenon of ice melting is analyzed through the change of temperature and liquid fraction on the abrasion/ice interface. The liquid fraction change as with time on the abrasion/ice surface is observed, which describes the ice-melting process well. The numerical results show that the ice melting process can be simulated effectively by the melting model. The de-icing process can be monitored by observing the change of the liquid fraction of the area around the abrasion/ice interface.

Combustion instability often occurs inside the combustion chamber of aero engine. Fuel atomization and evaporation, one of the controlling processes of combustion rate, is an important mechanism of the combustion instability. To tackle combustion instability, it challenges a deep understanding of the underlying mechanism of fuel atomization and evaporation. In this paper, acoustic field was established to simulate the pressure oscillation. Transient spray images of ethanol and kerosene were recorded using high-speed camera. The obtained images were processed by MATLAB to extract and analyze the related data. Spatial fuel atomization characteristics was analytically examined by multi-threshold image method to analyze the effect of the high frequency acoustic field on the fuel break-up and disintegration. The results show that the half spray cone angle on the side with speaker is suppressed by the presence of the imposed acoustic field compared with the case without speaker.

The airflow that enters the front grille of a ground vehicle for the purpose of component cooling has a significant effect on aerodynamic drag (engine airflow drag). Furthermore, engine airflow is known to be capable of influencing upstream external airflow (interference drag). The combined effect of these phenomena is commonly referred to as cooling drag, which generally contributes up to 10% of total vehicle drag. Due to this coupled nature, cooling drag is difficult to understand as it contains influences from multiple locations around the vehicle. A good understanding of the sources of cooling drag is paramount to drive vehicle design to a low cooling drag configuration. In this work, a production level Lincoln MKZ was modified so that a number of variables could be tested in both static ground and moving ground wind tunnel conditions. All tests were conducted at 80 MPH.