Gasket life criteria at low temperatures adopting proportional compensation for loss of flexibility and conformability

In the automobile industry, the service life of gaskets is defined as the time until which a released gasket recovers 60 % of the original compression. It was observed that the recovery curves of gaskets were highly nonlinear at high temperatures, and relatively nonlinear at temperatures above the room temperature. However, it was also noted that the recovery curves of the gaskets at temperatures below room temperature exhibited linearity with respect to the ln(time). Automotive manufacturers demand gasket life criteria that exceed a specific time or the entire life of a car. In the case of gaskets used at lower temperatures, since materials encounter losses in its flexibility and conformability, the definition of service life specifying a 60 % recovery may not be sufficiently safe to eliminate possible leakages. In this study, new gasket life criteria that could be used at low temperatures were proposed. The new criteria were proposed based on the change in Young’s modulus of the gasket material in order to conserve the sealing capability.     

Experimental study on performance of combined cambered-type wave absorbing beach

Wave simulation performance and its quality are key factors to reflect the overall capacity and level of an ocean engineering basin. They include wave simulating and absorbing capacity of reflected waves. In order to reduce the influence of reflected waves, various wave absorbing devices are equipped in ocean engineering basins across the world. The experimental investigation into the performance of combined cambered-type wave absorbing beach (CCTWAB) with damping bars equipped in Deepwater Offshore Basin is conducted. The experiment adopts the two-point method. The reflection coefficients are calculated by the method, in which the incident and reflected waves can be separated from the physically simulated composite waves with different periods and wave heights in the time domain. The experimental results indicate that in the range of normal wave heights and periods for model tests, the CCTWAB with damping bars is excellent in eliminating the reflected waves.     

Systematic budget allocation for transportation construction projects: a case in Taiwan

It has always been a daunting task for any government to allocate the budgets for public infrastructure effectively so as to maximize the benefits of the limited resources. The most important contribution this paper makes is to conduct an empirical study of the budget allocations of the six region-based road system construction plans in northern Taiwan using the transportation budget allocation model devised in this paper. After reviewing the results, the experts consulted while preparing this paper believe that these results are both objective and able to meet the actual requirements. The competent authority also believes that they are better than those obtained using their original approach. In particular, the construction of this model takes into consideration the highest-level supervisors. To a certain degree, it caters for the practices in budget allocation so that the managers are able to assume the authority corresponding to their responsibility concerning management efficiency and final outcomes.     

Parameter transfer of common-metric attributes in choice analysis: implications for willingness to pay

There is a growing literature that promotes the presence of a mix of compensatory and semi-compensatory processing strategies in the way that individuals evaluate packages of attributes in real or hypothetical markets, and make choices. This paper proposes a specification for the utility form in a choice model to test if, given a pair of attributes with a common-metric (e.g., components of travel time or cost), the attribute with the dominating level defines the marginal (dis)utility that is assigned to both attributes. We refer to this processing strategy as a parameter transfer rule. We use a stated choice data set, in the context of car driving individuals choosing between tolled and non-tolled routes, to estimate a mixed logit model which incorporates the presence of the parameter transfer rule and the conventional fully compensatory rule, both existing up to a probability. We find that if this parameter transfer heuristic is part of the mix, the WTP is more than 30% higher, on average, than when only a fully compensatory rule is imposed. We also contrast the parameter transfer rule with other semi-compensatory heuristics which have been investigated in other papers, and show that the finding adds further support to the accumulating evidence that a semi-compensatory attribute processing rules tend to result in higher mean WTP estimates compared to the fully compensatory attribute processing rule.     

Automatic semantic analysis of software requirements through machine learning and ontology approach

Nowadays, software requirements are still mainly analyzed manually, which has many drawbacks (such as a large amount of labor consumption, inefficiency, and even inaccuracy of the results). The problems are even worse in domain analysis scenarios because a large number of requirements from many users need to be analyzed. In this sense, automatic analysis of software requirements can bring benefits to software companies. For this purpose, we proposed an approach to automatically analyze software requirement specifications (SRSs) and extract the semantic information. In this approach, a machine learning and ontology based semantic role labeling (SRL) method was used. First of all, some common verbs were calculated from SRS documents in the E-commerce domain, and then semantic frames were designed for those verbs. Based on the frames, sentences from SRSs were selected and labeled manually, and the labeled sentences were used as training examples in the machine learning stage. Besides the training examples labeled with semantic roles, external ontology knowledge was used to relieve the data sparsity problem and obtain reliable results. Based on the SemCor and WordNet corpus, the senses of nouns and verbs were identified in a sequential manner through the K-nearest neighbor approach. Then the senses of the verbs were used to identify the frame types. After that, we trained the SRL labeling classifier with the maximum entropy method, in which we added some new features based on word sense, such as the hypernyms and hyponyms of the word senses in the ontology. Experimental results show that this new approach for automatic functional requirements analysis is effective.     

Discretionary activity location choice: in-home or out-of-home?

This paper examines the location choice associated with discretionary activities (in-home vs. out-of-home). These substitution patterns are important in terms of travel demand as in-home activities do not necessitate travel while out-of-home activities incur travel. Mixed logit models are estimated using an activity dataset (2003 CHASE data) to analyze the factors associated with this choice at the individual activity-level. Results suggest that the attributes of an activity significantly contribute to understanding the likelihood of engaging in out-of-home activities. Activity type interaction terms reveal the varying influence that socio-demographics, activity attributes and travel have over four different activity types modeled. The results reveal that the location choice (in-home vs. out-of-home) is sensitive to travel characteristics. As the travel time and cost increases, an individual is less likely to engage in an activity out-of-home. Compared to passive and social activities, the location of active activities is more sensitive to changes in travel attributes.     

Uncertainty analysis of value for money assessment for public-private partnership projects

In recent years, private sectors are encouraged to take an active part in franchising of urban infrastructure investments and operations, which promotes the rapid development of public-private partnership (PPP) in infrastructure and public service supply. Value for money (VFM) assessment has been officially proposed to provide a reference for selection of projects planning to adopt PPP. Based on the bottlenecks of VFM application in China and the uncertainties for urban infrastructure PPP projects, a discounted cash flow (DCF) model is established for VFM of infrastructure PPP projects. Then, a Monte Carlo simulation model is established on the basis of uncertainty factors for VFM. Through the analysis of Huai’an trams PPP project, coping strategies of uncertainties for VFM are put forward. Findings of the research may propel the establishment of a complete VFM evaluation system for PPP projects. Key instructional functions of VFM during the process of decision-making can be brought into full play and PPP may develop orderly.     

钢夹层板数值模拟技术(英文)

Sandwich plate systems (SPS) are advanced materials that have begun to receive extensive attention in naval architecture and ocean engineering. At present, according to the rules of classification societies, a mixture of shell and solid elements are required to simulate an SPS. Based on the principle of stiffness decomposition, a new numerical simulation method for shell elements was proposed. In accordance with the principle of stiffness decomposition, the total stiffness can be decomposed into the bending stiffness and shear stiffness. Displacement and stress response related to bending stiffness was calculated with the laminated shell element. Displacement and stress response due to shear was calculated by use of a computational code write by FORTRAN language. Then the total displacement and stress response for the SPS was obtained by adding together these two parts of total displacement and stress. Finally, a rectangular SPS plate and a double-bottom structure were used for a simulation. The results show that the deflection simulated by the elements proposed in the paper is larger than the same simulated by solid elements and the analytical solution according to Hoff theory and approximate to the same simulated by the mixture of shell-solid elements, and the stress simulated by the elements proposed in the paper is approximate to the other simulating methods. So compared with calculations based on a mixture of shell and solid elements, the numerical simulation method given in the paper is more efficient and easier to do.     

Study on launch dynamics of the tank marching fire

As an army main battle equipment, it is required that the tank should have high firing accuracy and high first round hit probability during marching. The initial disturbance of the projectile is the premier factor that takes effect on the marching fire accuracy of the tank. And the marching fire accuracy of the tank depends on the launch dynamics behaviors of the tank. In this paper, the launch dynamics theory of a tank marching fire is studied, and its launch dynamics model is established. Based on the transfer matrix method for multibody system(MSTMM) and the automatic deduction theorem of overall transfer equations, the overall transfer equation and the overall transfer matrix of a tank multibody system are deduced; the launch dynamics equations of the tank marching fire are deduced, and the dynamic response of the tank system, the motion of projectile in barrel, the initial disturbance of the projectile and the vertical target dispersion are exactly simulated; meanwhile, the results of simulation are verified by tests. This work provides both theoretical foundation and simulation approaches for improving the marching fire accuracy of the tank.     

Fusion of remote sensing images based on nonsubsampled contourlet transform and region segmentation

The purpose of remote sensing images fusion is to produce a fused image that contains more clear, accurate and comprehensive information than any single image. A novel fusion method is proposed in this paper based on nonsubsampled contourlet transform (NSCT) and region segmentation. Firstly, the multispectral image is transformed to intensity-hue-saturation (IHS) system. Secondly, the panchromatic image and the component intensity of the multispectral image are decomposed by NSCT. Then the NSCT coefficients of high and low frequency subbands are fused by different rules, respectively. For the high frequency subbands, the fusion rules are also unalike in the smooth and edge regions. The two regions are segregated in the panchromatic image, and the segmentation is based on particle swarm optimization. Finally, the fusion image can be obtained by performing inverse NSCT and inverse IHS transform. The experimental results are evaluated by both subjective and objective criteria. It is shown that the proposed method can obtain superior results to others.