Browse Topic: Flooring
As manufacturers push for increased productivity, low-value tasks such as material transport have become clear targets for improvement. In efforts to reduce material transport in large facilities, companies have explored the use of intermediate warehouse areas throughout the production floor. However, this takes up valuable space, requires additional material processing and handling, and creates opportunities for errors and lost or misplaced materials.
As robots increasingly join people on the factory floor, in warehouses and elsewhere on the job, dividing up who will do which tasks grows in complexity and importance. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Institute have developed an algorithmic planner that helps delegate tasks to humans and robots. The planner, “Act, Delegate or Learn” (ADL), considers a list of tasks and decides how best to assign them. The researchers asked three questions: When should a robot act to complete a task? When should a task be delegated to a human? And when should a robot learn a new task?
As robots increasingly join people on the factory floor, in warehouses and elsewhere on the job, dividing up who will do which tasks grows in complexity and importance. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Institute have developed an algorithmic planner that helps delegate tasks to humans and robots. The planner, “Act, Delegate or Learn” (ADL), considers a list of tasks and decides how best to assign them. The researchers asked three questions: When should a robot act to complete a task? When should a task be delegated to a human? And when should a robot learn a new task?
Polyurethane foam (PU foam) is widely used in automotive noise reduction palliatives. As a decoupling insulator its acoustic performance depends on intrinsic properties, called “Biot” parameters. An important decoupling parameter is the apparent stiffness of the PU foam cell structure, as this controls the transportation of vibrational energy, with “softer PU foam” being the preferred option. However, some areas of application, for example in automotive carpet design, requires stiffer PU foam in order to accommodate under foot comfort. For a comprehensive approach to automotive component design, it is necessary to calculate the appropriate spatial PU foam properties ideally without the need for series of prototypes. This paper describes the methods and processes used when compiling and validating a material database capable of predicting the acoustic performance of flat sample or spatially complex 3D component with minimal prototype manufacture.
There’s no doubt that Industrial Ethernet (IE) is paving the way for the automated factory of the future. IE is the backbone of modern industrial communications between devices on the plant floor, the enterprise information network, and the cloud services that companies increasingly rely upon to build and grow their business. At the macro level, IE is as essential to automation control as the internet is to e-commerce.
The interior floor of a vehicle cabin occupies a significant amount of surface area in proportion to the cabin as a whole, and as such provides a prime opportunity for acoustic treatment. Generally speaking, floor materials must be relatively limp to achieve high acoustic performance. However, the tactile quality of a vehicle floor is very important. The end customer has an expectation for how it should feel to step onto the floor of a vehicle: a carpet should “give” slightly, but not compress fully, under pressure. A carpet that is too stiff or not stiff enough may be perceived as indicative of low quality. Thus, acoustic targets and stiffness targets tend to be at odds. A vehicle interior floor is a trim component which consists of different layers and which can have different pile-up configurations. Such a pile-up typically consists of a soft layer, called a decoupler, and a top layer. Previous work has shown how CAE tools can predict part-level compression behavior during design and work in conjunction with established tools for NVH performance prediction. This paper will examine the acoustic effects of compression behavior of floor materials as installed in the vehicle by means of several vehicle-level acoustic tests, both static and dynamic.
Bus drivers are a group at risk of often suffering from musculoskeletal problems, such as low-back pain, while bus passengers on the last-row seats experience accelerations of high values. In this paper, the contribution of K-seat in decreasing the above concern is investigated with a detailed simulation study. The K-seat model, a seat with a suspension that functions according to the KDamper concept, which combines a negative stiffness element with a passive one, is benchmarked against the conventional passive seat (PS) in terms of comfort when applied to different bus users’ seats. More specifically, it is tested in the driver’s and two different passengers’ seats, one from the rear overhang and one from the middle part. For the benchmark shake, both are optimized by applying excitations that correspond to real intercity bus floor responses when it drives over a real road profile. Then a human model is placed on the seats in order to compare their optimum solutions in terms of the user’s whole-body vibrations (WBVs), using objective comfort metrics. Based on the results, the K-seat improves significantly the comfort of the users (~92%) compared to the PS, while it achieves a similar decrease in the maximum values of the user’s back accelerations (~97%).
Harold F. Pitcairn, American aviation and Autogiro pioneer, died from a single gunshot wound to the head in the late evening hours of April 23, 1960 at the age of 62 after a gala evening at which he presided over a celebration attended by more than 450 guests for his brother's Raymond's 75th birthday. Initially labelled a suicide by the press, Pitcairn's widow Clara declared that "she never wanted to hear another word about the tragedy", while friends and friendly local authorities made the argument, duly reported by Frank Kingston Smith in Legacy of Wings, his devotional Pitcairn biography (subsidized by the Pitcairn family), that the death was accidental because "there was no note, no indication of depression or unhappiness" and "the police investigation disclosed that two shots had been fired; one had penetrated the ceiling directly over the desk in the first floor study, another had struck Pitcairn in the eye" and that "the next morning it was discovered the semi-automatic pistol was defective: when cocked, it had a supersensitive "hair trigger," and it had a faulty disconnector so that it would fire more than one shot at a time, a condition known as "doubling."" The Pitcairn families, prominent and powerful, prevailed upon the local authorities to declare the death accidental and Kingston Smith's 1981account became the de facto authoritative story of the death of Harold F. Pitcairn. With the perspective, however, of six decades, it appears far more likely that Pitcairn's death was a suicide for reasons that were not readily evident, minimized, unappreciated or deliberately ignored at the time to craft a result that met the needs of Clara Pitcairn and her surviving family. These included the fact that while the claim was made that Pitcairn was making his nightly rounds to check on the estate’s ground-level windows (and had been doing so since the Lindbergh kidnapping in 1932), he actually died at his desk; that those in the house only reported a single shot; the 1907 Savage pistol had no reputation for a hair-trigger, and had not evidenced such a flaw in almost three decades of Pitcairn's nightly ritual; that even though Pitcairn had been assured that his almost-decade-long lawsuit against the United States government for Patent infringement of his Autogiro patents was going well, he was concerned about the impact this lawsuit was having on his aged associates who had been called to give depositions and he had voiced the sentiment that "if he had known that he would have to sue the government, he would not have gone into the Autogiro business"; that the lawsuit, itself intended as a vindication of Pitcairn's contribution to aviation was dragging on and would reach its first legal conclusion in 1967, and not finally conclude upon appeal until 1977; and most importantly, those who deny suicide and point to Pitcairn’s state-of-mind, have failed to take into account when the death occurred or ready evidence of his 'state of mind' To fail to see the tragic end of Harold F. Pitcairn is to forget that 29 years and one day earlier, he had been recognized for "the greatest achievement in aeronautics or astronautics in America, with respect to improving the performance, efficiency, and safety of air or space vehicles, the value of which has been thoroughly demonstrated by actual use during the preceding year." The memory of that day on the White House back lawn with the President was the high point of his life even as Pitcairn prepared to celebrate his older brother's achievements. The evidence, when marshalled and documented, conclusively points to suicide - a death of an American aviation pioneer before his contributions were vindicated in the largest patent infringement judgement against the United States in history. To fail to see the tragic end of Harold F. Pitcairn is to forget that 29 years earlier, he had been recognized for "the greatest achievement in aeronautics or astronautics in America".
Researchers have turned 20 kilometers of undersea fiber-optic cable into the equivalent of 10,000 seismic stations along the ocean floor. A 3.5 magnitude quake and seismic scattering from underwater fault zones were recorded. The technique, which had previously been tested with fiber-optic cables on land, could provide much-needed data on quakes that occur under the sea, where few seismic stations exist, leaving 70% of Earth's surface without earthquake detectors.
The ability to construct a composite, semimonocoque, damage-resistant, cargo floor for a rotary wing application using an IM7 graphite/polyetheretherketone (PEEK) composite with in-situ tape-placement fabrication technology has been demonstrated. Through an evolutionary process, a damage-tolerant thermoplastic composite cargo floor was designed according to realistic requirements, and subelement representative structures were developed to verify the design viability and approach. The fabricated and tested structural composite floor subelements demonstrated the feasibility of the technology, illustrated the ability to customize the design to meet unique cargo floor properties (e.g., cargo-loading features), and validated the maturity of the approach and fabrication technology for rotary-wing applications.
This paper examines the performance of passive structural vibration attenuating devices in rotary wing applications and introduces a new attenuating device to rotary wing applications, the NASA-developed Disruptive Tuned Mass (DTM) device. The testbed uses an OH-58D tailboom rigidly mounted to the floor as a cantilever beam with a first lateral mode resonant frequency of approximately 6.25 Hz as a representative rotary wing structure. The study characterizes the modal response of the tailboom without an attenuating device installed, with additional mass installed, a mass-spring attenuating device, a fixed orifice Tuned Mass Damper (TMD), and a device based on NASA DTM technology. TMD and DTM devices were tested with 6 lbs (2.72 kg) and 19 lbs (8.61 kg) mitigation masses. The DTM devices achieved greater modal attenuation than the TMD devices, 88% and 96% respectively, for devices with 6 lbs (2.72 kg) and 19 lbs (8.61 kg) active masses.
Increasing customer expectations of comfort and convenience inside the vehicle has resulted in OEMs working on various solutions to improve interior ergonomics and overall layout. One of the key areas of focus has been the ease of ingress into and egress from the vehicle. But with increased sharing of platforms in OEM Model Lineup, due to obvious benefits like cost and common tooling/parts, it is very difficult to achieve improved results in different vehicles (like Hatchback, Notchback, SUV etc.) but with same underpinnings. One of the commonly used approaches is provision of false flooring via floor pads for front / Rear Passengers for easy Egress-Ingress. Floor Pads are used to maintain similar comfort levels across different vehicles sharing common platform and to maintain similar relationship between Foot resting positions and Side Sill. Various materials like Synthetic felts, Polyurethane (PU) foam blocks, Rubber blocks, expanded polypropylene etc. are used to this end as solid structures placed below carpet. Other than that Synthetic resin structures are also used for the mentioned purpose. Of the various requirements for any solution for this application, compressive strength is one of the key requirements. In this paper, for the application of Automotive Floor pad, firstly the most important criterion of compressive strength requirement is analytically established and quantified. Also, the same is verified through simulations, laboratory testing and usage surveys. Based on the study, the most suitable material or structures for the false flooring usage is concluded considering existing constraints.
Researchers at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) have developed a novel point mechanic piezoelectric system capable of sensing extremely small vibrations, forces, or strains. The system’s high sensitivity near resonance and low noise floor enable the sensor to detect various low-frequency parameters — such as miniscule changes in the gravity gradient, seismic waves, and acoustics — from minimum detectable signals in the surrounding environment. Traditional piezoelectric systems, such as gravity gradiometers and seismometers, have larger intrinsic noise and smaller signal-to-noise ratio, thus requiring more complex instrumentation (and often larger, more expensive, and more cumbersome instrumentation). NASA’s innovative point mechanic sensor instead uses a simple and unique system to detect minute parameter changes, leading to significantly lower cost and material requirements.
NASA's Langley Research Center has developed an enhanced design for a composite panel with a recessed core. NASA designed it to decrease the radiation efficiency and increase the transmission loss while maintaining load-bearing capability so it could be used in applications such as aircraft floors. Similar to traditional composite panels, the innovation possesses low weight characteristics, but in addition, it can be used in load-bearing applications. The invention was developed for NASA's Quiet Aircraft Technology Program. The superior design of the composite panel can be used in a wide variety of commercial applications wherever honeycomb is needed and improved acoustics are desired. NASA has patented and tested the novel design, and is interested in attracting development partners and potential licensees for the recessed core composite panel design.
Huge savings in cost and inspection times (as well as improved safety) could be obtained by performing in-service inspection of tank floors and walls with robotic devices. This would have a reduced environmental impact and meet EPA and state regulations.
A thin-film magnetic thermometer with integrated, superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID) readout has been designed for fast, precision temperature measurements in the 10-mK range. The compact magnetic thermometer consists of a miniature DC SQUID susceptometer with a dilute paramagnetic alloy deposited in one of the two series-configured, gradiometric SQUID pickup loops that form the SQUID inductance. Directly sensing the magnetic signal with the SQUID eliminates coupling losses that occur by transformer-coupling the signal to a remotely located SQUID, usually operating at a higher temperature, and consequently, with a higher noise floor.
A proof-of-concept technique has been developed for measuring and controlling the individual phases of array elements. Electro-optic steering and beam-forming of laser beams is an emerging field with devices such as optical phased arrays that are capable of steering with significantly reduced noise floors and that are faster by orders of magnitude.
On August 6, 2012, the Mars Curiosity rover successfully landed on the floor of Gale Crater on Mars. The Curiosity rover is about the size of a small SUV — 10 feet (3 meters) long, not including the arm, 9 feet (2.7 meters) wide, and 7 feet (2.2 meters) tall.
Currently, the chassis assembly contributes about 73 percent of the overall weight of a 14.63 m long haul trailer. This paper presents alternative design concepts for the structural floor of a van trailer utilizing sandwich panels with various material and geometric characteristics of the core layer in order to reduce its weight significantly below that of the current design configuration. The main objective of the new designs is to achieve optimal tradeoffs between the overall structural weight and the flexural stiffness of the floor. Various preliminary design concepts of the core designs were compared on the basis of a single section of the core structure. Six different designs were analyzed by weight, maximum displacement and maximum stress under bending and torsion loads. Each concept was kept uniform by length, thickness, loading and boundary conditions. Each design concept was examined through testing of scaled model for floor assemblies. Finite element analysis was used to compare the performance of various design configurations. Scaled models were also developed and prototyped, instrumented, and tested in the laboratory environment, in order to validate the predictions of the theoretical models. These models were developed as a means to predict and understand the actual performance of the various floor design configurations, either in the form of cross member panels or sandwich composite panels.
Short-block low-density parity-check (LDPC) codes of a special type are intended to be especially well suited for potential applications that include transmission of command and control data, cellular telephony, data communications in wireless local area networks, and satellite data communications. [In general, LDPC codes belong to a class of error-correcting codes suitable for use in a variety of wireless data-communication systems that include noisy channels.] The codes of the present special type exhibit low error floors, low bit and frame error rates, and low latency (in comparison with related prior codes). These codes also achieve low maximum rate of undetected errors over all signal-to-noise ratios, without requiring the use of cyclic redundancy checks, which would significantly increase the overhead for short blocks. These codes have protograph representations; this is advantageous in that, for reasons that exceed the scope of this article, the applicability of protograph representations makes it possible to design high-speed iterative decoders that utilize belief-propagation algorithms.
In this study, soy-based polyurethane foam was reinforced with randomly oriented flax fiber to create green composite paneling. This paneling can be used as replacement for plywood in mass transit flooring. To establish optimal material properties, the flax/foam composite's density was modified through manipulation of both fiber volume fraction and foam void content in order to determine processing modification upon mechanical performance. Both static flexural testing and dynamic low velocity impact were performed. Mechanical characterization was performed by both flexural testing and screw fastener pullout studies. Resultant properties demonstrate the feasibility of lower maintenance renewable composite materials as replacement for current transit flooring.
The SAE 2010 World Congress, with the theme “Ecollaboration: engage. exchange. excel,” will be held April 13-15, 2010, at Cobo Center in Detroit, MI. With this theme, host company Ford is calling for collaboration as a way to develop innovative solutions to overcome economic and environmental challenges. With its 2010 World Congress, SAE International truly seeks to be innovative, not just in the technical content that is provided at the show but also in the way the show is presented. Driven by a desire to create an event that reflects the current state of the automotive industry and the opportunity to establish an event that will be sustainable in the long term, World Congress organizers-even prior to the ′09 event-reached out to key constituents, hosted focus groups, and conducted surveys to ensure that the event accurately meets the needs of its customers. This feedback eventually led to major changes to the exhibit for 2010 as well as the way exhibitors are chosen and the types of technologies that are discussed. While maintaining the event's core values, the SAE 2010 World Congress, to be held April 13-15 at Cobo Center in Detroit, MI, was designed to be shorter and smarter. Breaking from the traditional four days, this year's event will cover three days and will only feature the most innovative technologies on the show floor. To participate in the event as an exhibitor, companies had to submit an application detailing the noteworthy technologies to be displayed and then have that application reviewed by a panel of OEM engineers and executives, who then selected only the most innovative technologies to be present on the show floor.
Analog optical links are finding increased application in commercial and military systems ranging from radio-over-fiber applications, antenna remoting, and optical signal processing. As the performance of an analog link improves with received photocurrent, optical amplifiers — predominantly erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (EDFAs) — have been readily incorporated into a variety of systems. It is known that the addition of an optical amplifier (EDFA) raises the electrical noise floor in both digital and analog applications due to the presence of amplified spontaneous emission (optical) noise. To mitigate this additional noise in systems employing EDFAs prior to modulation, dual-output optical modulators and balanced detection are frequently employed. This technique has been utilized alone to achieve the first multi-gigahertz bandwidth analog optical link with a noise figure
Integrally Armored Helicopter Floor.
Propagation characteristics of electromagnetic waves generated by an electric dipole are used for a variety of applications, including geological mapping of mineral deposits on the ocean floor, cellular or mobile communications, and detection of unexploded ordnance. Mapping of the regional geology in deep-ocean, near- bottom locations has led to discovery of poly- metallic sulfide mineral deposits in the vicinity of hydrothermal vents on mid-ocean ridges potentially worth billions of dollars.
Carpetlike random arrays of metal-coated silicon nanotips have been shown to be effective as antireflection surfaces. Now undergoing development for incorporation into Sun sensors that would provide guidance for robotic exploratory vehicles on Mars, nanotip carpets of this type could also have many uses on Earth as antireflection surfaces in instruments that handle or detect ultraviolet, visible, or infrared light.
An improved braking cable-payout mechanism has been developed. Like other such mechanisms, this mechanism can be used as a braking or shock-absorbing device for any of a variety of purposes — for example, enabling a person to descend from an upper floor of a burning building at a safe speed, capturing and slowing a moving vehicle, or limiting the shock load generated by opening of a parachute. Whereas other such mechanisms operate at payout speeds that vary with the length of payout, this mechanism operates at approximately constant payout speed, regardless of the length of cord that has already been paid out.
A remote alarm circuit provides visible and audible signals to indicate that there is little unused space left on magnetic and optical tracks on disks used to record voice signals in a group of three multichannel voice recorders. In the particular application for which the remote alarm circuit was built, the voice recorders are required to operate without interruption, but the technicians responsible for the continuous operation of the voice recorders perform most of their duties on a different floor of the building in which the voice recorders are located. The remote alarm circuit gives sufficient advance warning to enable the technicians to go to the voice recorders and change recording disks in time to ensure continuity of recording.
Nanocarpets — that is, carpets of carbon nanotubes — are undergoing development as means of trapping microscopic particles for scientific analysis. Examples of such particles include inorganic particles, pollen, bacteria, and spores. Nanocarpets can be characterized as scaled-down versions of ordinary macroscopic floor carpets, which trap dust and other particulate matter, albeit not purposefully. Nanocarpets can also be characterized as mimicking both the structure and the particle-trapping behavior of ciliated lung epithelia, the carbon nanotubes being analogous to cilia (see figure).
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