Determination of the Causes of Copper Wires Beads after Fire in Vehicles

An electrical installation that simulates an automobile DC power supply system with a voltage of 12 V has been created. An experimental simulation of a short circuit at currents up to 400 A on copper multi-wire and single-wire conductors under normal environmental conditions is carried out. The copper wires beads were annealed in a furnace at temperatures from 700 to 1000 °C for 20, 40 and 60 minutes. Metallographic analysis of copper wires beads was carried out. The temperatures and times that of at which the signs of short circuit and overcurrent are destroyed has been revealed. Obtained results contribute to improvement evidence’s researching in the fire investigation of motor vehicles electrical wiring after a fire. Keywords: Arc beads, Copper, Metallographic analysis, Electrical Short Circuit, Wires.

Improvement of test methods and criteria for evaluation of resistance to flame propagation of long elements of the wiring system

The test methods for flame propagation of long elements of the electrical wiring system, in particular, cables, cable conduits and ducts, are analyzed, and differences in them are found in the test conditions and criteria for evaluating the resistance to flame propagation. Using a substrate of a wooden board covered with a layer of tissue paper with an areal density of (21±9) g/m2, adopted for testing other elements of the electrical wiring system, a cable was identified that is not resistant to flame propagation. It is proposed to use this substrate for testing the flame propagation of cables instead of a substrate made of a double layer of filter paper with a surface density of (80±15) g/m2. In one of three experiments, a cable that was not resistant to flame propagation was found based on the criterion of the presence of ignition of the substrate located under it. To reduce the risk of making an incorrect decision on compliance, it is proposed that the assessment of long elements of the wiring system be carried out according to the rules established for cable ducts, trays and ladders in EN 50085-1 and IEC 61537. For the AVVG cable with an outer diameter of 10 mm to 60 mm, when it touches the blue flame cone of 1 kW, the correlation coefficient of the dependence of the length of the charred part on the diameter was 0.969. For a distance of 100 mm between the sample and the burner along its axis, a correlation coefficient of 0.985 was obtained. It is proposed to test cables under the second condition recommended in IEC 60695-11-2. For two conduits, flame propagation was revealed when exposed to a 1 kW flame for 120 s and 240 s. However, for these pipelines, flame propagation did not occur under standard conditions of exposure to such a flame for 20 s and 25 s. To identify long elements of the wiring system that are not resistant to flame propagation, it is proposed to test them at a duration of exposure to a flame of 1 kW, established for cables in IEC 60332-1-2

Fabrication of Suspended PMMA-Graphene Membrane for High Sensitivity LC-MEMS Pressure Sensor

The LC-MEMS pressure sensor is an attractive option for an implantable sensor. It senses pressure wirelessly through an LC resonator, eliminating the requirement for electrical wiring or a battery system. However, the sensitivity of LC-MEMS pressure sensors is still comparatively low, especially in biomedical applications, which require a highly-sensitive sensor to measure low-pressure variations. This study presents the microfabrication of an LC wireless MEMS pressure sensor that utilizes a PMMA-Graphene (PMMA/Gr) membrane supported on a silicon trench as the deformable structure. The (PMMA/Gr) membrane was employed to increase the sensor’s sensitivity due to its very low elastic modulus making it easy to deform under extremely low pressure. The overall size of the fabricated sensor was limited to 8 mm × 8 mm. The experimental results showed that the capacitance value changed from 1.64 pF to 12.32 pF when the applied pressure varied from 0 to 5 psi. This capacitance variation caused the frequency response to change from 28.74 MHz to 78.76 MHz. The sensor sensitivity was recorded with a value of 193.45 kHz/mmHg and a quality factor of 21. This study concludes that the (PMMA/Gr) membrane-based LC-MEMS pressure sensor has been successfully designed and fabricated and shows good potential in biomedical sensor applications.

IoT Smart Home Lighting System using Arduino UNO and ESP8266

Today, a wide variety of IoT applications and services have appeared and one of them is the Smart Home. The objective of this article is to present basic electrical wiring using Arduino UNO board and ESP8266, writing in C programming Language in Arduino software Integrated Development Environment (IDE) to develop and build a prototype Smart Home Lighting System that displays the lighting of two fluorescent lamps when the switch button was turned on by the user from ESP8266 Web Server. The system installation has a real-time synchronization that is necessary and safe for immersive IoT applications.<br>

IoT Smart Home Lighting System using Arduino UNO and ESP8266

Today, a wide variety of IoT applications and services have appeared and one of them is the Smart Home. The objective of this article is to present basic electrical wiring using Arduino UNO board and ESP8266, writing in C programming Language in Arduino software Integrated Development Environment (IDE) to develop and build a prototype Smart Home Lighting System that displays the lighting of two fluorescent lamps when the switch button was turned on by the user from ESP8266 Web Server. The system installation has a real-time synchronization that is necessary and safe for immersive IoT applications.<br>

AMUET Digital 4.0 IOT Platform for Naval Electrical Installations

Modern ships are designed around complex and sophisticated electronic systems, highly dependent on electrical power, all interconnected with a large array of electrical wiring that were designed with CAD systems. Until now, the manufacturing, installation and testing had been performed with conventional tools and handheld meters, requiring thousands of manhours and multiple reworks. The author presents a new generation handheld-size wireless automated test equipment that are now integrating Industry 4.0 processes to support the design, manufacturing, installation, testing and sustainment of the complex electrical sub-systems associated with ships functional and mission systems.

High Magnetoelectric Coupling of Metglas and P(VDF-TrFE) Laminates

Magnetoelectric (magnetic/piezoelectric) heterostructures bring new functionalities to develop novel transducer devices such as (wireless) sensors or energy harvesters and thus have been attracting research interest in the last years. We have studied the magnetoelectric coupling between Metglas films (2826MB) and poly(vinylidene fluoride-trifluoroethylene) (P(VDF-TrFE)) in a laminate structure. The metallic Metglas film itself served as bottom electrode and as top electrode we used an electrically conductive polymer, poly(3,4-ethylene-dioxythiophene): poly(styrene sulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS). Besides a direct electrical wiring via a graphite ink, a novel contactless readout method is presented using a capacitive coupling between the PEDOT: PSS layer and an electrode not in contact with the PEDOT:PSS layer. From the experimental result we determined a magnetoelectric coupling of 1445 V/(cm×Oe) at the magnetoelastic resonance of the structure, which is among the highest reported values for laminate structures of a magnetostrictive and a piezoelectric polymer layer. With the noncontact readout method, a magnetoelectric coupling of about 950 V/(cm×Oe) could be achieved, which surpasses previously reported values for the case of direct sample contacting. 2D laser Doppler vibrometer measurements in combination with FE simulations were applied to reveal the complex vibration pattern resulting in the strong resonant response.

Fatigue Behavior of Nonreinforced Hand-Holes in Aluminum Light Poles

Hand-holes are present within the body of welded aluminum light poles. They are used to provide access to the electrical wiring for both installation and maintenance purposes. Wind is the main loading on these slender aluminum light poles and acts in a very cyclic way. In the field, localized fatigue cracking has been observed. This includes areas around hand-holes, most of which are reinforced with a cast insert welded to the pole. This study is focused on an alternative design, specifically hand-holes without reinforcement. Nine poles with 18 openings were fatigue tested in four-point bending at various stress ranges. Among the 18 hand-holes tested, 17 failed in one way or another as a result of fatigue cracking. Typically, fatigue cracking would occur at either the 3:00 or 9:00 positions around the hand-hole and then proceed to propagate transversely into the pole before failure. Finite element analysis was used to complement the experimental study. Models were created with varying aspect ratios to see if the hand-hole geometry had an effect on fatigue life.

An Improved Preventive Maintenance Scheduling for a Photovoltaic Plant under Environmental Constraints

To be able to supply PV power that satisfies customer demand at all times, there is need for the generating plant to be available at all time. However, with the increased age and usage of the components, the component’s reliability reduces resulting to failure. These failures were due to a range of causes such as degradation and electrical wiring aging and cuts leading to a reduced performance efficiency and reliability. Therefore, to ameliorate the reliability of the system, a combined selective and preventive maintenance actions were planned by determining the best combination (optimal preventive maintenance intervals, optimal replaced components). In this work, an optimal preventive maintenance strategy with minimal repair was developed using iterative numerical technique for a photovoltaic (PV) plant with and without considering the influence of environmental condition on the system. An algorithm was developed on MATLAB to determine the optimal number of preventive maintenance actions that yields maximum availability by selecting the components to be maintained based on the reliability threshold without considering the environmental impact on the components. The environmental elements’ criticality was introduced and the reliability reiterated based on the new technique. Finally, by maximizing the availability of the system, an optimal preventive maintenance for a finite horizon was established.