Innovative Hybrid Reinforcement for Flexural Members

The capacity and ductility of RC slabs are affected by the use of fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) as their main reinforcement for repair and rehabilitation. The balance between increasing the capacity and reducing the ductility of flexural members reinforced with FRP was always a matter of discussion. In this research, innovative hybrid reinforcement system (HRS) was introduced to provide the required increase in capacity while keeping the ductility within an acceptable range. Ten RC one-way slabs were tested in this investigation. They included a control slab which was reinforced with ordinary steel, while the rest of the slabs were reinforced internally with HRS with nine different profiles. The main variables considered in this study were the type of core or perimeter reinforcement and the number of perimeter reinforcing layers. It was revealed that the use of the innovative HRS resulted in remarkable increases in section ultimate load capacity as well as ductility.     

Heuristic on-line tuning for nonlinear model predictive controllers using fuzzy logic

In this paper a systematic mechanism for on-line tuning of the non-linear model predictive controllers is presented. The proposed method automatically adjusts the prediction horizon P, the diagonal elements of the input weight matrix Λ, and the diagonal elements of the output weight matrix Γ for the sake of good performance. The desired good performance is cast as a time-domain specification. The control horizon (M) is left constant because of the importance of its relative value with respect to P. The concepts from fuzzy logic are used in designing the tuning algorithm. In the mechanism considered here, predefined fuzzy rules represent available tuning guidelines and the performance violation measure in the form of fuzzy sets determine the new tuning parameter values Therefore, the tuning algorithm is formulated as a simple and straightforward mechanism, which makes it more appealing for on-line implementation. The effectiveness of the proposed tuning method is tested through simulated implementation on three non-linear process examples. Two of these examples possess open-loop unstable dynamics. The result of the simulations shows that this method is successful and promising.     

Engineering ATM networks for congestion avoidance

With the combination of telecommunication, entertainment and computer industries, computer networking is adopting a new method called Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) networking. Congestion control plays an important role in the effective and stable operation of ATM networks. Traffic management concerns with the design of a set of mechanisms which ensure that the network bandwidth, buffer and computational resources are efficiently utilized while meeting the various Quality of Service (QoS) guarantees given to sources as part of a traffic contract. In this paper, the most widely recognized congestion control schemes for ABR service are investigated. Some of these schemes show either lack of scalability or fairness while other well‐behaved schemes may require a highly complex switch algorithm that is unsuitable for implementation in cell‐switching high‐speed ATM networks. A new and improved congestion control scheme is proposed to support the best‐effort ABR traffic. This algorithm provides the congestion avoidance ability with high throughput and low delay, in addition to achieving the max–min fairness allocation. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Manganese Distribution between FeO‐MnO‐SiO2–CaO–MgO‐Al2O3 Slags and Molten Iron

Pretreatment of high manganese hot metal is suggested to produce hot metal suitable for further processing to steel in conventional LD converter and rich manganese slags satisfy the requirements for the production of silicomanganese alloys. Manganese distribution between slag and iron represents the efficiency of manganese oxidation from hot metal. The present study has been done to investigate the effect of temperature, slag basicity and composition of oxidizer mixture on the distribution coefficient of manganese between slag and iron. Ferrous oxide activity was determined in molten synthetic slag mixtures of FeO‐MnO‐SiO₂–CaO–MgO‐Al₂O₃. The investigated slags had chemical compositions similar to either oxidizer mixture or slags expected to result from the treatment of high manganese hot metal. The technique used to measure the ferrous oxide activity in the investigated slag systems was the well established one of gas‐slag‐metal equilibration in which molten slags contained in armco iron crucibles are exposed to a flowing gas mixture with a known oxygen potential until equilibrium has been attained. After equilibration, the final chemical analysis of the slags gave compositions having a particular ferrous oxide activity corresponding to the oxygen potential of the gas mixture. The determined values of ferrous oxide activity were used to calculate the equilibrium distribution of manganese between slag and iron. Higher manganese distribution between slag and iron was found to be obtained by using oxidizer containing high active iron oxide under acidic slag and relatively low temperature of about 1350°C.     

Tensile behaviour of anchored blind bolts in concrete filled square hollow sections

In this paper, the tensile behaviour of a new type of blind bolt, the anchored blind bolt, has been studied. This type of bolt consists of a conventional blind bolt with a headed stud extension that anchors it into the infill concrete. It has been developed for use in moment-resisting connections between I-beams and concrete-filled hollow section columns. The behaviour of these connections is highly dependent on the tensile behaviour of the anchored blind bolts. Hence, the fundamental mechanics of this behaviour has been studied here, both experimentally and in simulations using FE models. The complex interactions between the headed stud anchorage, the concrete infill, and the steel tube have been examined in detail. The experimental and numerical findings were used to understand the influence of important parameters in the tensile behaviour of the anchored blind bolts. It was found that the location of the bolt with respect to the side walls of the tube had a substantial influence on the behaviour of the anchored blind bolts. All the bolts located close to the side walls of the square hollow sections reached the ultimate tensile capacity of the equivalent structural bolts. This was due to the development of a concrete strut which transferred the load to the corner of the steel section. The bolt diameter also had a significant influence on the stiffness and strength of the anchored blind bolts.     

Parallel variable neighborhood search for solving fuzzy multi-objective dynamic facility layout problem

In spite of the classic approaches of solution of dynamic facility layout problem, which only material handling and rearrangement costs are considered as objective function, these problems are the multi-objective problems. In this paper, a mixed integer linear programming formulation is presented for multi-objective dynamic facility layout problem concerning flexible bay structure. In addition, three current objectives in dynamic facility layout problems including minimizing material handling and rearrangement costs, maximizing adjacency rate, and minimizing shape ratio difference have been considered. Also, for solving this problem, two methods including the GAMS software and proposed parallel variable neighborhood search (PVNS) algorithm are used. So, it is worth mentioning that four test problems are solved by them, and the results show that the proposed PVNS algorithm is more efficient than the GAMS software.     

Prediction Enthalpy of Hydrocarbon Vapor at Atmospheric Pressure

A generalized enthalpy-temperature correlation for light hydrocarbon vapor has been developed to represent the data for a wide range of temperatures 460-1080°F. Detailed analysis shows that the proposed correlation fits the experimental measurements of vapor enthalpy with the corresponding calculated values with an overall absolute error of 1.8% for 131 data points.     

A study of bounds on limit cycles in digital filters

We give bounds on the self-sustained limit cycles in fixed-poin implementations of state-variable-form digital filters having general stable system matrices. These bounds, which are period independent and which concern limit cycles due to quantization errors in physical realizations of digital filters, are given in closed form for second-order sections. A numerical comparison shows that the bounds are smaller than corresponding ones reported in the literature. This is due to our use of real similarity transformations.     

An Improved Viscosity-Temperature Correlation for Crude Oils

The available data of crude oil viscosity over a temperature range 130-220°F and at atmospheric pressure are used to develop a method to predict the viscosity of crude oils. The proposed correlation based upon API gravity, and viscosity at reservoir temperature. The proposed new correlation has been verified using data base on crude oil of different densities, and it shows significantly better correlation, with an average absolute deviation (AAD) of 2.8%.     

Effects of Temperature and Pressure on Natural Gas Viscosity Which Has Different API Gravities

The theory of gas transport is simply stated, but it is quite complex to express in equations that can be used directly to calculate viscosity. A correlation was developed to predict viscosity of natural gas (of different API gravities) function of temperature and pressure. This correlation depends only on API gravity of natural gas. The proposed correlation has been verified using data of about 246 data points, and it is shows significantly better correlation, with an average absolute error of 3.2%.