Workers’ rest allowance and smoothing of the workload in assembly lines

Ergonomic aspects have a crucial role in manual assembly systems. They impact on the workers’ health, final product quality and productivity. For these reasons, there is the necessity to integrate them into the assembly line balancing phase as, whereas, only time and cost variables are considered. In this study, human energy expenditures are considered as ergonomic aspects and we integrate them, for the first time, into the assembly line balancing problem type 2 through the rest allowance evaluation. We consider as an objective function the minimization of the smoothness index. Firstly, a new optimal method based on mixed integer linear programming and a new linearization methodology are proposed. Then, a heuristic approach is introduced. To complete the study, a computational experimentation is presented to validate the mathematical model and to compare the methodologies proposed in terms of computational time, complexity and solution. Additionally, we provide a detailed analysis of the impact that rest allowance evaluation can have on productivity comparing the results obtained, taking into account the rest allowance integration before, during and after the assembly balancing process.     

Ageing workforce management in manufacturing systems: state of the art and future research agenda

The workforce ageing phenomenon is recently affecting most of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) member countries, due to a general ageing of their populations and a higher average retirement age of the workforce. In this paper, the topic of ageing workforce management is addressed from a production research standpoint, with the aim of understanding how older workers can be supported and involved in a manufacturing system. First, the current state of the art related to the ageing workforce in production systems is presented. This is structured according to four main topics: (1) analysis and evaluation of ageing workers’ functional capacities, (2) consideration of ageing workers’ capacities in industrial system modelling and management, (3) analysis and exploitation of ageing workers’ expertise, (4) acknowledgement, analysis, design and integration of supporting technologies. Next, the discussion on the impact of the ageing workforce on manufacturing systems’ performances leads to the comparison of some technological advances that are related to the Industry 4.0 paradigms. Finally, a future research agenda on this topic is proposed, based on the same topics classification proposed for the literature analysis. Five different research areas are derived, suggesting future directions for appropriate research concerning the employ of older workers in production environments.     

红外光谱法用于快速测定车用柴油酸度等性质的研究

针对车用柴油酸度等性质测定过程繁琐，采用衰减全反射样品池测定车用柴油的红外光谱，用偏最小二乘法（PLS）建立红外光谱测定车用柴油酸度、密度、闪点和凝点的4个校正模型，验证标准误差分别为0.46 mg/(100 mL),0.77kg/m3,2.60 ℃,2.77 ℃，该方法符合标准方法再现性要求。与标准方法相比，该方法具有无需预处理、操作简单、测量快速、重复性好等优点。     

新国标烯烃限值的无铅汽油对汽车耐久性能的影响

选用3种轿车,使用烯烃含量接近新国标限值35％的无铅汽油,行驶8×10~4km,进行整车和发动机台架检测,并对进气阀和喷嘴进行评定。试验结果表明,在行驶8×10~4km后,整车的动力性、经济性很稳定,电喷车的排放检测值符合现行国标的限值要求;进气阀较清洁,喷嘴流量损失小;发动机外特性、比油耗、活塞窜气量、汽缸压缩压力等都变化不大。这说明,符合现行国标烯烃限值要求的无铅汽油适合目前我国汽车的使用并能满足现行排放法规的要求。     

管理系统设计中的人体工程设计思想

目前人体工程学的应用领域主要集中于机器或生产环境等“硬”系统的研究与设计，其设计的思想、内容与程序对具有“软”系统特征的管理系统设计具有深远影响。文章对管理系统设计中的人体工程设计思想进行了讨论。     

Model-guided evaluation of consumer products

An evaluation of a consumer product is presented as an example of how ergonomics models can guide data collection and interpretation by non-ergonomists. The product, a new cooking pan, was compared with its earlier counterpart on performance and safety tests for specific features. Model-guided evaluations produced data which could be well-fitted by linear relationships, and measures derived from the data could be interpreted in physical terms by engineers. This is now the standard methodology for pan evaluation in the client company.     

高性能双相钢的研究进展

双相钢以其低屈服点、高的加工硬化率,以及连续屈服行为等优良的冲压成型性能,已成为未来发展轻质量高安全性汽车的主要材料.本文通过对高性能双相钢的合金化特点、生产工艺、力学性能以及发展现状等方面的介绍,揭示了其在汽车工业中的广泛应用前景,并探讨了我国高性能双相钢研发的有效途径.     

基于OSEK规范的网络管理的研究与改进

首先论述了基于OSEK规范的网络管理特点并对OSEK网络管理的工作机制进行了详细分析;在基于OSEK网络管理特点和工作机制的基础上,对OSEK网络管理在以太网上的扩展、资源占有率优化和实时性提高几个方面给出了解决方案。     

Research and Applications of Semi-solid Processing

Since it was pioneered by Flemings and otherresearchers [11, the semi-solid metal processingtechnique has been widely stUdied in the world.Especially in the past decade, SSM as a newproduct forming technique has been rapidly developed and put into commercial applications[2, 31. In recent years, with the development ofthe ado-industry of China, a lot of researchwork on SSM has been done, including the preparation of slumes, reheating and thixoforming[Al6]; moreover, great achievements have …