Effect of Welding Parameters on the Microstructure and Strength of Friction Stir Weld Joints in Twin Roll Cast EN AW Al-Mn1Cu Plates

Twin roll cast EN AW Al-Mn1Cu plates were butt welded with the friction stir welding process which employed a non-consumable tool, tilted by 1.5° and 3° with respect to the plate normal, rotated in a clockwise direction at 400 and 800 rpm, while traversing at a fixed rate of 80 mm/min along the weld line. Microstructural observations and microhardness tests were performed on sections perpendicular to the tool traverse direction. Tensile tests were carried out at room temperature on samples cut perpendicular to the weld line. The ultimate tensile strength of the welded EN AW Al-Mn1Cu plates improved with increasing tool rotation speed and decreasing tool tilt angle. This marked improvement in ultimate tensile strength is attributed to the increase in the heat input owing to an increased frictional heat generation. There appears to be a perfect correlation between the ultimate tensile strength and the size of the weld zone. The fracture surfaces of the base plate and the welded plates are distinctly different. The former is dominated by dimples typical of ductile fractures. A vast majority of the intermetallic particles inside the weld zones are too small to generate dimples during a tensile test. The fracture surface of the welded plates is thus characterized by occasional dimples that are elongated in the same direction suggesting a tensile tearing mechanism.     

A novel Al–Ti–B alloy for grain refining Al–Si foundry alloys

Al–Ti–B refiners with excess-Ti (Ti:B > 2.2) perform adequately for wrought aluminium alloys but they are not as efficient in the case of foundry alloys. Silicon, which is abundant in the latter, forms silicides with Ti and severely impairs the potency of TiB₂ and Al₃Ti particles. Hence, Al–Ti–B alloys with excess-B (Ti:B < 2.2) and binary Al–B alloys are favored to grain refine hypoeutectic Al–Si alloys. These grain refiners rely on the insoluble (Al,Ti)B₂ or AlB₂ particles for grain refinement, and thus do not enjoy the growth restriction provided by solute Ti. It would be very attractive to produce excess-B Al–Ti–B alloys which additionally contain Al₃Ti particles to maximize their grain refining efficiency for aluminium foundry alloys. A powder metallurgy process was employed to produce an experimental Al–3Ti–3B grain refiner which contains both the insoluble AlB₂ and the soluble Al₃Ti particles. Inoculation of a hypoeutectic Al–Si foundry alloy with this grain refiner has produced a fine equiaxed grain structure across the entire section of the test sample which was more or less retained for holding times up to 15 min.     

Spatiotemporal distribution of facilitation and inhibition of return arising from the reflexive orienting of covert attention.

Currently, there is debate regarding both the spatial and temporal relationship between facilitation and inhibition of return (IOR) components of attention, as observed on the covert orienting of visual attention task (COVAT). These issues were addressed in a series of experiments where the spatial and temporal relationships between cue and target were manipulated. Facilitation occurred only when the stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) was short and there was temporal overlap between cue and target. IOR occurred only when SOA was long and there was no temporal overlap between cue and target. Facilitation encompassed the cued location and all locations between the cue and fixation, whereas IOR arose for the entire cued hemifield. These findings suggest that the facilitation and IOR found on COVATs that use noninformative peripheral cues are separable and stimulus-driven processes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Thermal Fatigue Testing of Tool Materials for Thixoforging of Steels

Semisolid processing, already a well established manufacturing route for the production of intricate, thin‐walled aluminium and magnesium parts with mechanical properties as good as forged grades, faces a major challenge in the case of steels. The tool materials must withstand complex load profiles and relatively higher forming temperatures for thousands of forming cycles for industrial application to be attractive. Since the forming pressures are much lower than those encountered in conventional forging, the principle die failure mechanism in steel thixoforging is expected to be thermal fatigue. Hence, suitable materials able to withstand the steel thixoforming environment for an economically acceptable life, can be best identified with a thermal fatigue test. Such a test is described in the present work. A novel CrNiCo and a nickel‐base superalloy, reported to exhibit superior thermal fatigue resistance in demanding tooling applications, was tested under thermal fatigue conditions encountered in the thixoforming of steels.     

A Stochastic Approach for Blind Estimation of Multiple Co-Channel Signals Received at an Antenna Array

A stochastic maximum likelihood approach for blind estimation of co-channel signals received at an antenna array is proposed in this letter. A hidden Markov model formulation of the problem is introduced and the Baum-Welch algorithm for the associated stochastic maximum likelihood estimation procedure is modified. The performance of the proposed algorithm based on the evaluation of approximate Cramer-Rao bounds is studied. Finally, some simulation results are presented.     

Iliac artery stenosis measurements: comparison of two-dimensional time-of-flight and three-dimensional dynamic gadolinium-enhanced MR angiography

OBJECTIVE: We compared our ability to make iliac artery measurements on two-dimensional (2D) time-of-flight (TOF) and three-dimensional dynamic gadolinium-enhanced MR angiography with conventional angiography. SUBJECTS AND METHODS: Fifteen patients with lower extremity vascular disease underwent pelvic MR angiography. Parameters of the cardiac-gated axial 2D TOF sequence included a TR/TE of 24/7 msec and a 50 degrees flip angle. Parameters for the three-dimensional MR angiography sequence, in which we obtained 32 coronal 3-mm slices with fat suppression, included a TR/TE of 32/5 msec and a 40 degrees flip angle during infusion of 40 ml of gadolinium-chelated contrast material. Patients then underwent conventional angiography of the iliac arteries. Maximum stenosis in the common iliac, external iliac, and common femoral arteries was then measured. Measurements of stenosis were compared by repeated measures of analysis of variance. Sensitivity and specificity were calculated for identification of greater than or equal to 50% stenosis and less than 50% stenosis. RESULTS: For all vessels studied, we found no significant difference in measurements obtained from the gadolinium-enhanced MR angiography technique and those obtained from conventional angiography (p > .05). However, significantly different stenotic measurements were obtained from the 2D TOF MR angiography sequence and conventional angiography. In the external iliac arteries, 2D TOF MR angiography exaggerated stenoses most substantially. Gadolinium-enhanced MR angiography achieved 100% sensitivity and specificity. CONCLUSION: Dynamic gadolinium-enhanced MR angiography was more accurate than 2D TOF MR angiography when measuring degree of stenosis in the iliac arteries.     

Topography based design of the T-DAB SFN for a mountainous area

A method for designing a terrestrial digital audio broadcasting single frequency network (T-DAB SFN) for a mountainous region is proposed. A computer database and the digital terrain elevation data are used in designing the network. Two fundamental approaches are compared; first, utilization of the existing transmitter sites is maximized by applying the initial cost constraint; then, the coverage percent of the service is forced to approach to 100% by applying the coverage efficiency constraint. Finally, a T-DAB SFN hybrid design procedure optimizing both constraints is proposed. The three design approaches are illustrated on the coverage of the mountainous Istanbul-Ankara highway. The results are compared using a reference cost look up table. The hybrid approach is shown to optimize the initial cost and the coverage efficiency, and can be applied to similar networking problems     

3TP: an application-Layer protocol for streaming 3-D models

This paper addresses the problem of streaming progressively compressed three-dimensional (3-D) models over lossy networks. Out of all encoded packets that can be transmitted, we intelligently choose a subset of packets to be transmitted using transport control protocol in order to meet a distortion constraint, while transmitting the remaining packets using user datagram protocol to minimize the end-to-end delay. We call this new application-layer protocol 3-D models transport protocol. We show the effectiveness of this protocol both experimentally and theoretically. We compare the performance of the proposed protocol with systems that do not optimize transmission according to the content of the encoded bitstream. When the maximum distortion is 30, measured using the Hausdorff distance, we achieve savings in delay time ranging from 39% to 68% for packet-loss rates between 1% and 19%.     

Elimination of Yersinia enterocolitica on carrots (Daucus carota L.) by using household sanitisers

In this study, the effects of lemon juice, the mixture of lemon juice–vinegar (1:1) and lemon dressing against Yersinia enterocolitica on carrot were investigated. Carrots inoculated with Y. enterocolitica cells (approximately 10⁶ cfu/ml) were treated with 100%, 75% and 50% lemon juice, a mixture of lemon juice–vinegar, and lemon dressing for 0, 15, 30 and 60 min. Enumeration of Y. enterocolitica populations on CIN agar beside TSA agar by using two methods as then performed. One hundred percent lemon juice was the most effective agent used, completely inhibiting viable cells of Y. enterocolitica on carrot after 15 min exposure. Although no growth was observed on carrots treated with 100% lemon juice for 15 min, there was no statistical difference between the antibacterial effects of 100% lemon juice, 75% lemon juice, the mixture of lemon juice–vinegar and lemon dressing whilst the effect of 50% lemon juice was statistically different from those solutions (P < 0.05) and its definite inhibitive activity was seen after 60 min treatment.     

Effect of femtosecond laser beam angle and formed shape on surface roughness and shear bond strength between zirconia and resin cement

Achieving adhesion between resin cement and zirconia requires pretreatment of the surface. This in vitro study aimed to evaluate the effect of femtosecond laser beam angle and the shape of the formed surfaces, on the roughness and shear bond strength (SBS) of resin cement to zirconia ceramic. Seventy Y-TZP ceramic specimens were divided into seven groups (n = 10). A femtosecond laser irradiation was performed on the ceramic surface of three shapes (spiral (SP), square (SQ) and circular (CI) and at two angles (30 and 90°) to give SP-30, SQ-30 and CI-30 and SP-90, SQ-90 and CI-90, respectively. After treatment, the surface roughness of all specimens was evaluated using a profilometer. One specimen from each group was analysed using a scanning electron microscope. The bonded specimens were thermocycled 5000 times and then an SBS test was performed. Kruskal-Wallis and Mann-Whitney U tests were used to analyse surface roughness and SBS values. The control group had statistically lower surface roughness (R_a) values than the treated groups (p < 0.05). SP-30 and SQ-30 laser treated specimens showed higher R_a values than the other specimens. Statistically significant SBS values (p = 0.000) were observed between the groups. All laser treated samples showed greater SBS compared to the control group. SP-30, SQ-30 and SQ-90 groups showed the highest SBS values. Within the limitations of this experimental study, the highest mean values for R_a and SBS were achieved with SP and SQ surfaces using a 30° angle laser beam.