A Laboratory Device to Measure the Interfacial Phenomena between Rubber and Rough Surfaces

Abstract The interfacial phenomena between tread rubber compounds and rough surfaces are responsible for most of the behavior of a tire on the road. A new device was developed for the investigation of these phenomena in the laboratory. The device consists of a fully instrumented road wheel on which a simple geometry specimen is driven. The possibilities offered by this device are to perform tests at constant slip or at constant torque on both wet and dry surfaces, with complex cycles. The machine allows the measurement of slip, tangential forces, and temperature on the specimen, and computer software adds the possibility of applying Fourier analyses on force, road wheel speed, and specimen speed data. Other possibilities offered by the road wheel are to change the road surface, the load on the specimen, and the water rate. The description of a complete experiment is detailed in the paper showing the correlation of data with actual tire performances.

Download Full-text

TRUCK SAFETY BARRIERS FOR MINING SITES

The ANZIAM Journal ◽

10.1017/s1446181117000281 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 59 (1) ◽

pp. 35-50

Author(s):

NEVILLE FOWKES ◽

STEVE DURKIN ◽

ANDREW P. BASSOM

Keyword(s):

Field Tests ◽

Open Pit ◽

Front Face ◽

Dump Truck ◽

Case Scenario ◽

Primary Resistance ◽

Worst Case ◽

New Device ◽

The Road ◽

On The Road

Safescape is a Western Australian company that has recently developed a device for improved safety in open-pit mines. Serious accidents can occur when large trucks veer off the roads running around the edge of the mine. The conventional technique to mitigate the risk is to pile waste rock to form a so-called bund on the edge of the road. This method is not fail safe though as vehicles can, and do, drive completely over the bund. In this paper, we describe a new device that consists of a row of filled polyethylene shell units which are linked together and sit on the road side of the rock bund. The vertical front face of the edge protector prevents out of control dump trucks from climbing over the bund and into the pit, so that they push against the barriers and heave the broken rock behind the bund. The models developed here suggest that the primary resistance to an impacting truck is provided by the large heaving force with the barrier simply facilitating this process. The theory indicates that the total resistance is independent of truck speed, meaning that simple barrier pushing experiments are sufficient to validate the analysis. The conclusions of the theory and field tests suggest that in a worst-case scenario involving the normal impact of a 500 tonne filled dump truck, the barriers and bund move a few metres before coming to rest.

Download Full-text

A Simulation Study on the Potential of Moving Urban Freight by a Cross-City Railway Line

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su11216088 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 11 (21) ◽

pp. 6088 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Praful Potti ◽

Marin Marinov ◽

Edward Sweeney

Keyword(s):

United Kingdom ◽

Simulation Model ◽

Computer Software ◽

Simulation Software ◽

Actual System ◽

Urban Freight ◽

The Road ◽

Railway Line ◽

The United Kingdom ◽

On The Road

This paper analyses the scope for moving urban freight through rail by evaluating the utilisation levels of the Cross-City railway line in The United Kingdom (UK), running between Lichfield Trent Valley and Birmingham New Street. A simulation model of the railway system was built and implemented using SIMUL8 computer software. The results from the simulation model suggest that the railway line is being under-utilised. These low utilisation levels of the line presented a case to propose three scenarios that has the potential to carry urban freight by rail through Lichfield Trent Valley to Birmingham New Street Station. The total number of services operated on the line is varied between different scenarios. The proposed three scenarios could not only exploit the existing railway infrastructure by improving the utilisation levels of the currently operating railway line, but also proved to reduce an amount of green-house gases (GHGs) emissions that are caused by heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) moving on the road. After simulating all the proposed scenarios in the SIMUL8 simulation software and analysing the results, scenario number 3 seemed to be the best replacement to the actual system as it presents a case to increase the number of train services running per day by in the line by 108 and causing a drastic improvement in the utilisation levels by an increase of 341.71% to that of the actual system. This proposed system has the potential to eliminate 5400 HGVs moving on the road per day that causes a reduction of CO2 gas by approximately 5.4%. All the scenarios presented in the study assures a sustainable method to move the urban freight by rail that has the potential to reduce congestion and emissions in the West Midlands region of the United Kingdom (UK).

Download Full-text