Search results for: Performance Assessment.

Authors: Hadi Khosravi Farsani, Mohammadali Nematbakhsh

Abstract:

To overcome the product overload of Internet shoppers, we introduce a semantic recommendation procedure which is more efficient when applied to Internet shopping malls. The suggested procedure recommends the semantic products to the customers and is originally based on Web usage mining, product classification, association rule mining, and frequently purchasing. We applied the procedure to the data set of MovieLens Company for performance evaluation, and some experimental results are provided. The experimental results have shown superior performance in terms of coverage and precision.

Keywords: Personalization, Recommendation, OWL Ontology, Electronic Catalogs, Classification.

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Authors: Jaime R. S. Fonseca

Abstract:

Nevertheless the widespread application of finite mixture models in segmentation, finite mixture model selection is still an important issue. In fact, the selection of an adequate number of segments is a key issue in deriving latent segments structures and it is desirable that the selection criteria used for this end are effective. In order to select among several information criteria, which may support the selection of the correct number of segments we conduct a simulation study. In particular, this study is intended to determine which information criteria are more appropriate for mixture model selection when considering data sets with only categorical segmentation base variables. The generation of mixtures of multinomial data supports the proposed analysis. As a result, we establish a relationship between the level of measurement of segmentation variables and some (eleven) information criteria-s performance. The criterion AIC3 shows better performance (it indicates the correct number of the simulated segments- structure more often) when referring to mixtures of multinomial segmentation base variables.

Keywords: Quantitative Methods, Multivariate Data Analysis, Clustering, Finite Mixture Models, Information Theoretical Criteria, Simulation experiments.

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Authors: Erdinç Vural, Bülent Özdalyan, Serkan Özel

Abstract:

The four-stroke single cylinder diesel engine has been used in this study, the pistons and valves of the engine have been stabilized, the aluminum oxide (Al₂O₃) in different ratios has been added in the power of zirconium (ZrO₂) magnesium oxide (MgO), and has been coated with the plasma spray method. The pistons and valves of the combustion chamber of the engine are coated with 5 different (ZrO₂ + MgO), (ZrO₂ + MgO + 25% Al₂O₃), (ZrO₂ + MgO + 50% Al₂O₃), (ZrO₂ + MgO + 75% Al₂O₃), (Al₂O₃) sample. The material tests have been made for each of the coated engine parts with the scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) using Cu Kα radiation surface analysis methods. The engine tests have been repeated for each sample in any electric dynamometer in full power 1600 rpm, 2000 rpm, 2400 rpm and 2800 rpm engine speeds. The material analysis and engine tests have shown that the best performance has been performed with (ZrO₂ + MgO + 50% Al₂O₃). Thus, there is no significant change in HC and Smoke emissions, but NOx emission is increased, as the engine improves power, torque, specific fuel consumption and CO emissions in the tests made with sample A3.

Keywords: Ceramic coating, material characterization, engine performance, exhaust emissions.

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Authors: Bambang Ariantara, Nandy Putra, Rangga Aji Pamungkas

Abstract:

The development of electric vehicle batteries have resulted in very high energy density lithium-ion batteries. However, this progress is accompanied by the risk of thermal runaway, which can result in serious accidents. Heat pipes are heat exchangers that are suitable to be applied in electric vehicle battery thermal management for their lightweight, compact size and do not require external power supply. This paper aims to examine experimentally a Flat Plate Loop Heat Pipe (FPLHP) performance as a heat exchanger in thermal management system of lithium-ion battery for electric vehicle application. The heat generation of the battery was simulated using a cartridge heater. Stainless steel screen mesh was used as the capillary wick. Distilled water, alcohol and acetone were used as working fluids with a filling ratio of 60%. It was found that acetone gives the best performance that produces thermal resistance of 0.22 W/°C with 50°C evaporator temperature at heat flux load of 1.61 W/cm2.

Keywords: Electric vehicle, flat plate loop heat pipe, lithium-ion battery, thermal management system.

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Authors: Jure Galović, Peter Hofmann

Abstract:

Thermochemical energy storage (TCES), as a long-term and lossless energy storage principle, provides a contribution for the reduction of greenhouse emissions of mobile applications, such as passenger vehicles with an internal combustion engine. A prototype of a TCES system, based on reversible sorption reactions of LiBr composite and methanol has been designed at Vienna University of Technology. In this paper, the selection of reactive and inert carrier materials as well as the design of heat exchangers (reactor vessel and evapo-condenser) was reviewed and the cycle stability under real operating conditions was investigated. The performance of the developed system strongly depends on the environmental temperatures, to which the reactor vessel and evapo-condenser are exposed during the phases of thermal conversion. For an integration of the system into mobile applications, the functionality of the designed prototype was proved in numerous conducted cycles whereby no adverse reactions were observed.

Keywords: Mobile applications, LiBr composite, methanol, performance of TCES system, sorption process, thermochemical energy storage.

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Authors: Xinyuan Jiang, Genan Li, Zhiping Wu

Abstract:

Calcium magnesium acetate (CMA) is environmentally benign deicing chemicals that can replace sodium chloride that is widely used on roads and highways at present for snow and ice control to provide safe driving conditions during winter. The price of CMA from petroleum-derived acetic acid is quite expensive. The bamboo vinegar is the by-product from bamboo charcoal production. The bamboo vinegar was used to prepare calcium acetate as raw materials, and its deicing and corrosive performances were studied in this paper. The results show that the freezing temperature of calcium acetate is lower than that of sodium chloride when they have same molar concentration, the deicing performance of calcium acetate is better than that of sodium chloride when they have same moles, while the deicing performance of sodium chloride is better than that of calcium acetate. The corrosion of sodium chloride on iron-nail and steel-nail is larger than that of calcium acetate whether they have same mass concentration or same molar concentration, and the corrosion of sodium chloride and calcium acetate on iron-nail is larger than that on steel-nail, and calcium acetate almost hasn't corrosion on steel-nail.

Keywords: bamboo vinegar, calcium acetate, corrosion, deicer, deicing performance

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Authors: Dionisios Panagiotaras, Ioannis P. Kokkoris, Dionysios Koulougliotis, Dimitra Lekka, Alexandra Skalioti

Abstract:

In the summer of 2021, Greece was affected by devastating forest fires in various regions of the country, resulting in human losses, destruction or degradation of the natural environment, infrastructure, livestock and cultivations. The present study concerns a pilot assessment of natural vegetation regeneration in the second, in terms of area, fire-affected region for 2021, at Ancient Olympia area, located in West Peloponnisos (Ilia Prefecture), Greece. A standardised, field sampling protocol for assessing natural regeneration was implemented at selected sites where the forest fire had occurred previously (in 2007) and the vegetation (Pinus halepensis forest) had regenerated naturally. The results of the study indicate the loss of the established natural regeneration of Pinus halepensis forest, as well as of the tree-layer in total. Post-fire succession species are recorded to the shrub and the herb layer, with a varying cover. Present findings correspond to the results of field work and analysis one year after the fire, which will form the basis for further research and conclusions on taking action for restoration schemes in areas that have been affected by fire more than once within a 20-year period.

Keywords: Post-fire regeneration, Pinus halepensis, restoration management, policy implications.

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Authors: S. B. Kotsiantis, D. Kanellopoulos, P. E. Pintelas

Abstract:

Many factors affect the success of Machine Learning (ML) on a given task. The representation and quality of the instance data is first and foremost. If there is much irrelevant and redundant information present or noisy and unreliable data, then knowledge discovery during the training phase is more difficult. It is well known that data preparation and filtering steps take considerable amount of processing time in ML problems. Data pre-processing includes data cleaning, normalization, transformation, feature extraction and selection, etc. The product of data pre-processing is the final training set. It would be nice if a single sequence of data pre-processing algorithms had the best performance for each data set but this is not happened. Thus, we present the most well know algorithms for each step of data pre-processing so that one achieves the best performance for their data set.

Keywords: Data mining, feature selection, data cleaning.

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Authors: Khaled Abduesslam. M, Mohammed Ali, Basher H Alsdai, Muhammad Nizam, Inayati

Abstract:

This paper presents the voltage problem location classification using performance of Least Squares Support Vector Machine (LS-SVM) and Learning Vector Quantization (LVQ) in electrical power system for proper voltage problem location implemented by IEEE 39 bus New- England. The data was collected from the time domain simulation by using Power System Analysis Toolbox (PSAT). Outputs from simulation data such as voltage, phase angle, real power and reactive power were taken as input to estimate voltage stability at particular buses based on Power Transfer Stability Index (PTSI).The simulation data was carried out on the IEEE 39 bus test system by considering load bus increased on the system. To verify of the proposed LS-SVM its performance was compared to Learning Vector Quantization (LVQ). The results showed that LS-SVM is faster and better as compared to LVQ. The results also demonstrated that the LS-SVM was estimated by 0% misclassification whereas LVQ had 7.69% misclassification.

Keywords: IEEE 39 bus, Least Squares Support Vector Machine, Learning Vector Quantization, Voltage Collapse.

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Authors: Diako Azizi, Ahmad Gholami, Vahid Abbasi

Abstract:

High voltage generators are being subject to higher voltage rating and are being designed to operate in harsh conditions. Stator windings are the main component of generators in which Electrical, magnetically and thermal stresses remain major failures for insulation degradation accelerated aging. A large number of generators failed due to stator winding problems, mainly insulation deterioration. Insulation degradation assessment plays vital role in the asset life management. Mostly the stator failure is catastrophic causing significant damage to the plant. Other than generation loss, stator failure involves heavy repair or replacement cost. Electro thermal analysis is the main characteristic for improvement design of stator slot-s insulation. Dielectric parameters such as insulation thickness, spacing, material types, geometry of winding and slot are major design consideration. A very powerful method available to analyze electro thermal performance is Finite Element Method (FEM) which is used in this paper. The analysis of various stator coil and slot configurations are used to design the better dielectric system to reduce electrical and thermal stresses in order to increase the power of generator in the same volume of core. This paper describes the process used to perform classical design and improvement analysis of stator slot-s insulation.

Keywords: Electromagnetic field, field distribution, insulation, winding, finite element method

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Authors: Basavaraj Kabade, K. T. Nagaraja, Swathi Ramanathan, A. Veeraragavan, P. S. Reashma

Abstract:

Deteriorating quality of the pedestrian environment and the increasing risk of pedestrian crashes are major concerns for most of the cities in India. The recent shift in the priority to motorized transport and the abating condition of existing pedestrian facilities can be considered as prime reasons for the increasing pedestrian related crashes in India. Bengaluru City – the IT capital hub of the nation is not much different from this. The increase in number of pedestrian crashes in Bengaluru reflects the same. To resolve this issue and to ensure safe, sustainable and pedestrian friendly sidewalks, Govt. of Karnataka, India has implemented newfangled pedestrian sidewalks popularized programme named Tender S.U.R.E. (Specifications for Urban Road Execution) projects. Tender SURE adopts unique urban street design guidelines where the pedestrians are given prime preference. The present study presents an assessment of the quality and performance of the pedestrian side walk and the walkability index of the newly built pedestrian friendly sidewalks. Various physical and environmental factors affecting pedestrian safety are identified and studied in detail. The pedestrian mobility is quantified through Pedestrian Level of Service (PLoS) and the pedestrian walking comfort is measured by calculating the Walkability Index (WI). It is observed that the new initiatives taken in reference to improving pedestrian safety have succeeded in Bengaluru by attaining a level of Service of ‘A’ and with a good WI score.

Keywords: Pedestrian safety, pedestrian level of service, right of way, Tender SURE, walkability index, walkway facilities.

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Authors: Lee Yih Rou, Hishammuddin Asmuni

Abstract:

Flexible Job Shop Problem (FJSP) is an extension of classical Job Shop Problem (JSP). The FJSP extends the routing flexibility of the JSP, i.e assigning machine to an operation. Thus it makes it more difficult than the JSP. In this study, Cooperative Coevolutionary Genetic Algorithm (CCGA) is presented to solve the FJSP. Makespan (time needed to complete all jobs) is used as the performance evaluation for CCGA. In order to test performance and efficiency of our CCGA the benchmark problems are solved. Computational result shows that the proposed CCGA is comparable with other approaches.

Keywords: Co-evolution, Genetic Algorithm (GA), Flexible JobShop Problem(FJSP)

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Authors: Yeong-Hwa Chang, Chia-Wen Chang, Hung-Wei Lin, C.W. Tao

Abstract:

In this paper, an improved ant colony optimization (ACO) algorithm is proposed to enhance the performance of global optimum search. The strategy of the proposed algorithm has the capability of fuzzy pheromone updating, adaptive parameter tuning, and mechanism resetting. The proposed method is utilized to tune the parameters of the fuzzy controller for a real beam and ball system. Simulation and experimental results indicate that better performance can be achieved compared to the conventional ACO algorithms in the aspect of convergence speed and accuracy.

Keywords: Ant colony algorithm, Fuzzy control, ball and beamsystem

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Authors: Cha’o-Kuang Chen, Ching-Chang Cho

Abstract:

The study investigates the mixing performance of electrokinetically-driven power-law fluids in a microchannel containing patterned trapezoid blocks. The effects of the geometry parameters of the patterned trapezoid blocks and the flow behavior index in the power-law model on the mixing efficiency within the microchannel are explored. The results show that the mixing efficiency can be improved by increasing the width of the blocks and extending the length of upper surface of the blocks. In addition, the results show that the mixing efficiency increases with an increasing flow behavior index. Furthermore, it is shown that a heterogeneous patterning of the zeta potential on the upper surfaces of the trapezoid blocks prompts the formation of local flow recirculations, and therefore improves the mixing efficiency. Consequently, it is shown that the mixing performance improves with an increasing magnitude of the heterogeneous surface zeta potential.

Keywords: Non-Newtonian fluid, Power-law fluid, Electroosmotic flow, Passive mixer, Mixing, Micromixer.

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Authors: M. Saeedi, R. Wuchner, K.-U. Bletzinger

Abstract:

In order to study the aerodynamic performance of a semi-flexible membrane wing, Fluid-Structure Interaction simulations have been performed. The fluid problem has been modeled using two different approaches which are the vortex panel method and the numerical solution of the Navier-Stokes equations. Nonlinear analysis of the structural problem is performed using the Finite Element Method. Comparison between the two fluid solvers has been made. Aerodynamic performance of the wing is discussed regarding its lift and drag coefficients and they are compared with those of the equivalent rigid wing.

Keywords: CFD, FSI, Membrane wing, Vortex panel method.

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Authors: H. B. Kekre, Tanuja K. Sarode

Abstract:

This paper presents a very simple and efficient algorithm for codebook search, which reduces a great deal of computation as compared to the full codebook search. The algorithm is based on sorting and centroid technique for search. The results table shows the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm in terms of computational complexity. In this paper we also introduce a new performance parameter named as Average fractional change in pixel value as we feel that it gives better understanding of the closeness of the image since it is related to the perception. This new performance parameter takes into consideration the average fractional change in each pixel value.

Keywords: Vector Quantization, Data Compression, Encoding, Searching.

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Authors: A. Bajit, M. Nahid, A. Tamtaoui, E. H. Bouyakhf

Abstract:

In this paper, we propose a Perceptually Optimized Embedded ZeroTree Image Coder (POEZIC) that introduces a perceptual weighting to wavelet transform coefficients prior to control SPIHT encoding algorithm in order to reach a targeted bit rate with a perceptual quality improvement with respect to the coding quality obtained using the SPIHT algorithm only. The paper also, introduces a new objective quality metric based on a Psychovisual model that integrates the properties of the HVS that plays an important role in our POEZIC quality assessment. Our POEZIC coder is based on a vision model that incorporates various masking effects of human visual system HVS perception. Thus, our coder weights the wavelet coefficients based on that model and attempts to increase the perceptual quality for a given bit rate and observation distance. The perceptual weights for all wavelet subbands are computed based on 1) luminance masking and Contrast masking, 2) the contrast sensitivity function CSF to achieve the perceptual decomposition weighting, 3) the Wavelet Error Sensitivity WES used to reduce the perceptual quantization errors. The new perceptually optimized codec has the same complexity as the original SPIHT techniques. However, the experiments results show that our coder demonstrates very good performance in terms of quality measurement.

Keywords: DWT, linear-phase 9/7 filter, 9/7 Wavelets Error Sensitivity WES, CSF implementation approaches, JND Just Noticeable Difference, Luminance masking, Contrast masking, standard SPIHT, Objective Quality Measure, Probability Score PS.

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Authors: W. Chattinnawat

Abstract:

Consider a mass production of HDD arms where hundreds of CNC machines are used to manufacturer the HDD arms. According to an overwhelming number of machines and models of arm, construction of separate control chart for monitoring each HDD arm model by each machine is not feasible. This research proposed a strategy to optimize the SPC management on shop floor. The procedure started from identifying the clusters of the machine with similar manufacturing performance using clustering technique. The three way control chart ( I - MR - R ) is then applied to each clustered group of machine. This proposed research has advantageous to the manufacturer in terms of not only better performance of the SPC but also the quality management paradigm.

Keywords: Three way control chart. I - MR - R , between/within variation, HDD arm.

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Authors: Yong-Jun Kim, Jae-Hyun Ro, Chang-Bin Ha, Hyoung-Kyu Song

Abstract:

Because current wireless communication requires high reliability in a limited bandwidth environment, this paper proposes the variable modulation scheme based on the codebook. The variable modulation scheme adjusts transmission power using the codebook in accordance with channel state. Also, if the codebook is composed of many bits, the reliability is more improved by the proposed scheme. The simulation results show that the performance of proposed scheme has better reliability than the the performance of conventional scheme.

Keywords: MIMO-OFDM, variable modulation, codebook, channel state.

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Authors: Rimmy Yadav, Avtar Singh

Abstract:

Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) is a promising modern approach to the unused combinatorial optimization. Here ACO is applied to finding the shortest during communication link failure. In this paper, the performances of the prim’s and ACO algorithm are made. By comparing the time complexity and program execution time as set of parameters, we demonstrate the pleasant performance of ACO in finding excellent solution to finding shortest path during communication link failure.

Keywords: Ant colony optimization, link failure, prim’s algorithm.

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Authors: B. A. Parate, K. D. Deodhar, V. K. Dixit, V. Venkateswara Rao

Abstract:

This article outlines the ballistics of main seat ejection cartridges for aircraft application. The ballistics of main seat ejection cartridges plays a vital role during the ejection of the pilot in an emergency. The ballistic parameters such as maximum pressure, time to reach the maximum pressure, and time required to reach half the maximum pressure that responsible to the spinal injury of the pilot are assessed. Therefore, the evaluations of these parameters are very critical during various stages of development. Elaborate testing is carried out for main seat ejection cartridges on seat ejection tower (SET) at different operating temperatures considering physiological limits. As these trials are cumbersome in nature, a vented vessel (VV) testing facility is devised to lay down the performance parameters at hot and cold temperature conditions. Single base (SB) propellant having hepta-tubular configuration is selected as the main filling. Gun powder plays the role of a booster based on ballistic requirements. The evaluation methodology of various performance parameters of main seat ejection cartridges is explained in this paper. Physiological parameters such as maximum seat ejection velocity, acceleration, and rate of rising of acceleration are also experimentally determined on SET. All the parameters are observed well within physiological limits. This paper addresses the internal ballistic of main seat ejection cartridges, propellant selection, its calculation, and evaluation of various performance parameters for aircraft application.

Keywords: Ballistics of seat ejection, ejection seat, gas generator, gun propulsion, main seat ejection cartridges, maximum pressure, performance parameters, propellant, progressive burning and vented vessel.

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Authors: Mi-Hyang Lee, Seung-Hoon Han

Abstract:

Korean traditional residences have been built with deep design issues for various values such as social, cultural, and environmental influences to be started from a few thousand years ago, but its meaning is being vanished due to the different lifestyles these days. It is necessary, therefore, to grasp the meaning of the Korea traditional building called Hanok and to get Korean people understand its real advantages. The purpose of this study is to propose a standardization methodology for evaluating comfort features towards Korean traditional houses. This paper is also trying to build an official standard evaluation system and to integrate aesthetic and psychological values induced from Hanok. Its comfort performance values could be divided into two large categories that are physical and psychological, and fourteen methods have been defined as the Korean Standards (KS). For this research, field survey data from representative Hanok types were collected for each method. This study also contains a qualitative in-depth analysis of the Hanok comfort index by the professions using AHP (Analytical Hierarchy Process) and has examined the effect of the methods. As a result, this paper could define what methods can provide trustful outcomes and how to evaluate the own strengths in aspects of spatial comfort of Hanok using suggested procedures towards the spatial configuration of the traditional dwellings. This study has finally proposed an integrated development of a standardization methodology assessing the comfort performance for Korean traditional residences, and it is expected that they could evaluate inhabitants of the residents and interior environmental conditions especially structured by wood materials like Hanok.

Keywords: Hanok, comfort performance, human condition, analytical hierarchy process.

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Authors: Adeniyi G. Adeogun, Bolaji F. Sule, Adebayo W. Salami, Michael O. Daramola

Abstract:

Estimation of water yield and water balance in a river catchment is critical to the sustainable management of water resources at watershed level in any country. Therefore, in the present study, Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) interfaced with Geographical Information System (GIS) was applied as a tool to predict water balance and water yield of a catchment area in Nigeria. The catchment area, which was 12,992km², is located upstream Jebba hydropower dam in North central part of Nigeria. In this study, data on the observed flow were collected and compared with simulated flow using SWAT. The correlation between the two data sets was evaluated using statistical measures, such as, Nasch-Sucliffe Efficiency (NSE) and coefficient of determination (R²). The model output shows a good agreement between the observed flow and simulated flow as indicated by NSE and R², which were greater than 0.7 for both calibration and validation period. A total of 42,733 mm of water was predicted by the calibrated model as the water yield potential of the basin for a simulation period between 1985 to 2010. This interesting performance obtained with SWAT model suggests that SWAT model could be a promising tool to predict water balance and water yield in sustainable management of water resources. In addition, SWAT could be applied to other water resources in other basins in Nigeria as a decision support tool for sustainable water management in Nigeria.

Keywords: GIS, Modeling, Sensitivity Analysis, SWAT, Water Yield, Watershed level.

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Authors: Hu-Hsiao Hsu, Po-Ren Chung, Ming-Chin Ho, Chieh-Feng Tsai, Che-Ming Chiang, Shin-Ku Lee

Abstract:

Lighting upgrades involve relatively lower costs which allow the benefits to be spread more widely than is possible with any other energy efficiency measure. In order to popularize the adoption of CFL in Taiwan, the authority proposes to implement a new energy efficient lamp comparative label system. The current study was accordingly undertaken to investigate the factors affecting the performance and the deviation of actual and labeled performance of commercially available integrated CFLs. In this paper, standard test methods to determine the electrical and photometric performances of CFL were developed based on CIE 84-1989 and CIE 60901-1987, then 55 selected CFLs from market were tested. The results show that with higher color temperature of CFLs lower efficacy are achieved. It was noticed that the most packaging of CFL often lack the information of Color Rendering Index. Also, there was no correlation between price and performance of the CFLs was indicated in this work. The results of this paper might help consumers to make more informed CFL-purchasing decisions.

Keywords: Compact fluorescent lamp (CFL), Efficacy, Color Rendering Index (CRI), Energy saving.

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Authors: M. Othman, N. Bhuiyan, G. J. Gouw

Abstract:

In today-s competitive market, most companies develop manufacturing systems that can help in cost reduction and maximum quality. Human issues are an important part of manufacturing systems, yet most companies ignore their effects on production performance. This paper aims to developing an integrated workforce planning system that incorporates the human being. Therefore, a multi-objective mixed integer nonlinear programming model is developed to determine the amount of hiring, firing, training, overtime for each worker type. This paper considers a workforce planning model including human aspects such as skills, training, workers- personalities, capacity, motivation, and learning rates. This model helps to minimize the hiring, firing, training and overtime costs, and maximize the workers- performance. The results indicate that the workers- differences should be considered in workforce scheduling to generate realistic plans with minimum costs. This paper also investigates the effects of human learning rates on the performance of the production systems.

Keywords: Human Factors, Learning Curves, Workers' Differences, Workforce Scheduling

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Authors: Diako Azizi, Ahmad Gholami, Vahid Abbasi

Abstract:

High voltage generators are being subject to higher voltage rating and are being designed to operate in harsh conditions. Stator windings are the main component of generators in which Electrical, magnetical and thermal stresses remain major failures for insulation degradation accelerated aging. A large number of generators failed due to stator winding problems, mainly insulation deterioration. Insulation degradation assessment plays vital role in the asset life management. Mostly the stator failure is catastrophic causing significant damage to the plant. Other than generation loss, stator failure involves heavy repair or replacement cost. Electro thermal analysis is the main characteristic for improvement design of stator slot-s insulation. Dielectric parameters such as insulation thickness, spacing, material types, geometry of winding and slot are major design consideration. A very powerful method available to analyze electro thermal performance is Finite Element Method (FEM) which is used in this paper. The analysis of various stator coil and slot configurations are used to design the better dielectric system to reduce electrical and thermal stresses in order to increase the power of generator in the same volume of core. This paper describes the process used to perform classical design and improvement analysis of stator slot-s insulation.

Keywords: Electrical field, field distribution, insulation, winding, finite element method, electro thermal

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Authors: F. Charrua-Santos, S. Dias, J. Matias, F. Brójo, S. Azevedo.

Abstract:

The main objective of this paper is to analyse the influence of preparation and control of orders on performance. The focused activities explored in this research are: procurement, production and distribution. These changes in performance were obtained through improvement of the supply chain. It is proved using all the company activities that it is possible to increase de efficiency and do services in an adequate way, placing the products in the market efficiently. For that, it was explored the importance of the supply chain, with privilege to the practical environment and the quantification of the obtained results.

Keywords: Competitiveness, Order Preparation and Control, Procurement Process and Operations Efficiency, Supply Chain Global Costs

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Authors: Mengist Hailemariam, Silma Yoseph

Abstract:

A well designed and executed Production Planning and Control (PPC) system is one of the key levers for superior performance in the current manufacturing set-up. Hence, measuring the PPC system performance has become a necessity for long term success. The present study examined PPC related issues which impact the production capacity and productivity of leather companies with special focus on Kombolcha Tannery Share Company (KTSC), Ethiopia. Physical observation, interview, and questionnaire were used to generate necessary information from the respondents and reach valid conclusions. Company annual reports were referred and analyzed to triangulate primary data. Consequently, the study revealed that KTSC runs below its capacity due to its inefficient PPC system being in use for which the root causes were identified. The study thereby conceptualizes a PPC system improvement framework comprising three pillars viz., management culture, internal capability and performance measurement together with key considerations in each case. The study findings enable the company to recognize the importance of efficient PPC system as a source of competitive advantage. It also aid managers in evaluating various PPC execution schemes to enhance productivity.

Keywords: Ethiopia, Leather manufacturing, Production planning and control, PPC improvement framework.

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Authors: A. Shayeghi, H. Shayeghi, H. Eimani Kalasar

Abstract:

In recent years, tuned mass damper (TMD) control systems for civil engineering structures have attracted considerable attention. This paper emphasizes on the application of particle swarm application (PSO) to design and optimize the parameters of the TMD control scheme for achieving the best results in the reduction of the building response under earthquake excitations. The Integral of the Time multiplied Absolute value of the Error (ITAE) based on relative displacement of all floors in the building is taken as a performance index of the optimization criterion. The problem of robustly TMD controller design is formatted as an optimization problem based on the ITAE performance index to be solved using the PSO technique which has a story ability to find the most optimistic results. An 11- story realistic building, located in the city of Rasht, Iran is considered as a test system to demonstrate effectiveness of the proposed method. The results analysis through the time-domain simulation and some performance indices reveals that the designed PSO based TMD controller has an excellent capability in reduction of the seismically excited example building.

Keywords: TMD, Particle Swarm Optimization, Tall Buildings, Structural Dynamics.

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Authors: Kgabo H. Badimo, Sheryl Buckley

Abstract:

Knowledge is increasingly recognised in this, the knowledge era, as a strategic resource, by public sector organisations, in view of the public sector reform initiatives. People and knowledge play a vital role in attaining improved organisational performance and high service quality. Many government departments in the public sector have started to realise the importance of knowledge management in streamlining their operations and processes. This study focused on knowledge management in the public healthcare service organisations, where the concept of service provider competitiveness pales to insignificance, considering the huge challenges emanating from the healthcare and public sector reforms. Many government departments are faced with challenges of improving organisational performance and service delivery, improving accountability, making informed decisions, capturing the knowledge of the aging workforce, and enhancing partnerships with stakeholders. The purpose of this paper is to examine the knowledge management practices of the Gauteng Department of Health in South Africa, in order to understand how knowledge management practices influence improvement in organisational performance and healthcare service delivery. This issue is explored through a review of literature on dominant views on knowledge management and healthcare service delivery, as well as results of interviews with, and questionnaire responses from, the general staff of the Gauteng Department of Health. Web-based questionnaires, face-to-face interviews and organisational documents were used to collect data. The data were analysed using both the quantitative and qualitative methods. The central question investigated was: To what extent can the conditions required for successful knowledge management be observed, in order to improve organisational performance and healthcare service delivery in the Gauteng Department of Health. The findings showed that the elements of knowledge management capabilities investigated in this study, namely knowledge creation, knowledge sharing and knowledge application, have a positive, significant relationship with all measures of organisational performance and healthcare service delivery. These findings thus indicate that by employing knowledge management principles, the Gauteng Department of Health could improve its ability to achieve its operational goals and objectives, and solve organisational and healthcare challenges, thereby improving organisational performance and enhancing healthcare service delivery in Gauteng.

Keywords: Knowledge Management, Healthcare Service Delivery, Public Healthcare, Public Sector.

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