Automatic and Noninvasive Indoor Air Quality Control in HVAC Systems

This paper presents a methodology for assessing and monitoring the cleaning state of a heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) system of a building. It consists of a noninvasive method for measuring the amount of dust in the whole ventilation system, that is, the set of filters and air ducts. Specifically, it defines the minimum amount of measurements, their time table, locations, and acquisition conditions. The proposed method promotes early intervention on the system and it guarantees high indoor air quality and proper HVAC working conditions. The effectiveness of the method is proved by some experimental results on different study cases.

Entropy Analysis for MHD Generalised Couette Flow in a Composite Duct

This paper presents entropy analysis of electrically conducting Newtonian fluid flow inside a horizontal composite duct. The upper impermeable wall of the duct moves with a uniform velocity while the lower wall is porous strata of finite thickness with impermeable bottom. The upper wall and the impermeable bottom are at constant temperature but at different temperatures. The duct is divided into two regions: Region I of clear fluid and Region II of fluid saturated porous layer. Momentum and thermal regimes for clear and porous regions are matched at clear fluid-porous interface by employing suitable matching conditions. The governing equations are solved analytically. Analytical solutions obtained for velocity and temperature are utilized to compute entropy generation. The effects of pertinent parameter on temperature distribution, entropy generation, and Bejan number are portrayed graphically and discussed.

Cross Correlation for Condition Monitoring of Variable Load and Speed Gearboxes

The ability to identify incipient faults at an early stage in the operation of machinery has been demonstrated to provide substantial value to industry. These benefits for automated, in situ, and online monitoring of machinery, structures, and systems subject to varying operating conditions are difficult to achieve at present when they are run in operationally constrained environments that demand uninterrupted operation in this mode. This work focuses on developing a simple algorithm for this problem class; novelty detection is deployed on feature vectors generated from the cross correlation of vibration signals from sensors mounted on disparate locations in a power train. The behavior of these signals in a gearbox subject to varying load and speed is expected to remain in a commensurate state until a change in some physical aspect of the mechanical components, presumed to be indicative of gearbox failure. Cross correlation will be demonstrated to generate excellent classification results for a gearbox subject to independently changing load and speed. It eliminates the need to analyze the highly complex dynamics of this system; it generalizes well across untaught ranges of load and speed; it eliminates the need to identify and measure all predominant time-varying parameters; it is simple and computationally inexpensive.

Judo Economics in Markets with Multiple Firms

We study a sequential Bertrand game with one dominant market incumbent and multiple small entrants selling homogeneous products. Whilst the equilibrium for the case of a single entrant is well known from Gelman and Salop (1983), we derive properties of the N-firm equilibrium and present an algorithm that can be used to calculate this equilibrium. The algorithm is based on a recursive manipulation of polynomials that derive the optimisation problem that each of the market entrants is facing. Using this algorithm we derive the exact equilibrium for the cases of two and three small entrants. For more than three entrants only approximate results are possible. We use numerical results to gain further understanding of the equilibrium for an increasing number of firms and in particular for the case where N diverges to infinity. Similarly to the two-firm Judo equilibrium, we see that a capacity limitation for the small firms is necessary to achieve positive profits.

Acceptance Sampling Plans Based on Truncated Life Tests for Gompertz Distribution

An acceptance sampling plan for Gompertz distribution under a truncated life test is developed. For different acceptance numbers, consumer’s confidence levels and values of the ratio of the experimental time to the specified mean lifetime, the minimum sample sizes required to ensure the specified mean lifetime are obtained. The operating characteristic function values and the associated producer’s risks are also presented. An example is provided to illustrate the acceptance sampling plan.

Application of Markov Process in Performance Analysis of Feeding System of Sugar Industry

To analyse the performance measures of complex repairable systems having more than two states, that is, working, reduced and failed, it is essential to model suitably their states so that the system governs a stochastic process. In this paper, the application of time-homogeneous Markov process is used to express reliability and availability of feeding system of sugar industry involving reduced states and it is found to be a powerful method that is totally based on modelling and numerical analysis. The selection of appropriate units/components in designing a system with different characteristics is necessary for the system analyst to maintain the failure-free operation. Keeping this concept in this study, the steady state availability of concern system is analysed and optimized by using a popular search technique, genetic algorithm. The objective of this paper is to consider the system operative process as Markov process and find its reliability function and steady state availability in a very effective manner and also to obtain an optimal system designing constituents which will allow a failure-free operation for long time period as required for maximum system productivity. The system performance measures and optimized design parameters are described and obtained here by considering an illustrative example.

Effects of Chemical Reaction on Dissipative Radiative MHD Flow through a Porous Medium over a Nonisothermal Stretching Sheet

The steady two-dimensional radiative MHD boundary layer flow of an incompressible, viscous, electrically conducting fluid caused by a nonisothermal linearly stretching sheet placed at the bottom of fluid saturated porous medium in the presence of viscous dissipation and chemical reaction is studied. The governing system of partial differential equations is converted to ordinary differential equations by using the similarity transformations, which are then solved by shooting method. The dimensionless velocity, temperature, and concentration are computed for different thermophysical parameters, namely, the magnetic parameter, permeability parameter, radiation parameter, wall temperature parameter, Prandtl number, Eckert number, Schmidt number, and chemical reaction.

Mathematical Model of a Flash Drying Process

The paper presents a basic model of the flash drying process, as it is applied in a number of industrial applications, and illustrates this by means of a particular application: the drying of subbituminous coal. Besides its economic importance, that application is representative of those where the product is combustible, so that the drying needs to be conducted in an inert atmosphere, which is achieved by recycling some of the drying gas. A novel feature of the model is that it takes explicit account of the transport of heat and moisture within the coal particles. The model provides the basis for the development of a tool to support the design of a flash drying plant.

Asymptotic Dichotomy in a Class of Odd-Order Nonlinear Differential Equations with Impulses

We investigate the oscillatory and asymptotic behavior of a class of odd-order nonlinear differential equations with impulses. We obtain criteria that ensure every solution is either oscillatory or (nonoscillatory and) zero convergent. We provide several examples to show that impulses play an important role in the asymptotic behaviors of these equations.

Truncated Life Test Plans for Economic Reliability Based on Four-Parametric Burr Distribution

Burr distribution is considered as a probability model for the lifetime of products. Reliability test plans are those sampling plans in which items from a lot are put to test to make conclusions on the estimate of life, and hence acceptance or rejection of the submitted lot is done. A test plan designs the termination time of the experiment and the termination number for a given sample size and producer’s risk. Tables and graphs were provided for certain specific values of designs, and it is useful to verify the optimum reliability test plan realized by Burr distributions.