Designing appropriately - design projects to examine how contemporary civic buildings can be distinguishable in suburban and regional Australia

This research investigates contemporary architecture's difficulty in distinguishing new civic buildings from commercial and other non-public building types. Historically, the desire to create a clear typological distinction for the civic has come and gone through periods of time and key practitioners. Through projects, the masters attempts to formulate strategies to speak of the civic in the contemporary condition. The research aims to consider architectural language and its use in the context of new public buildings to establish a sense of difference from dominant urban typologies, and be grounded within a contemporary reading of the civic. This project-based research features three principal resolved design projects - a Civic Centre in Mildura; Council Offices for the City of Hume, Broadmeadows; and a new 'civic school' in the Melbourne outer suburb of Mill Park. The design process undertaken for each project is subject to investigation of selected precedents, both contemporary and historical, and these are explored through an illustrated written chapter

Marine Biomass Analyzer

This report documents the design, fabrication, and testing for a marine biomass analyzer. The goal of the project and constructed system was to determine the validity and efficacy of a process that could flatten benthic macrofauna to a consistent thickness such that a biomass for the collected sample could be accurately determined. The system that was built and tested consists of a drive train that turns a mill subassembly where the organisms are flattened, supply and collection spools that hold the white fabric and clear film used to capture the organisms, a collection zone where the sample is injected, and a superstructure that supports the device for rigidity and positioning of components. Through clever design, we were able to minimize the parts required to locate and tension the spools, allowing them to be removed and resupplied quickly. Additionally, the number of lost organisms that were not captured was minimized to under 5%. All components and fabrication were made using typical equipment found in a machine shop including a manual mill and lathe, laser cutter, 3D printer, and general shop tools. A software package called Matlab was used for image processing to determine sample size and calculate a biomass given the interpreted surface area of the caught sample. Ultimately, we were able to design, build, and test a system and analytical process that could determine the biomass of a sample to within ±10% of its actual value.We consider our proof-of-concept design to be a success and can be further developed upon with new iterations. Eventually, this system could be incorporated into an autonomous underwater rover that simultaneously collects, filters, and scans benthic samples to determine biomass and biodiversity in oceanic environments

Towards a new approach for enterprise integration : the semantic modeling approach

Manufacturing today has become a matter of the effective and efficient application of information technology and knowledge engineering. Manufacturing firms’ success depends to a great extent on information technology, which emphasizes the integration of the information systems used by a manufacturing enterprise. This integration is also called enterprise application integration (here the term application means information systems or software systems). The methodology for enterprise application integration, in particular enterprise application integration automation, has been studied for at least a decade; however, no satisfactory solution has been found. Enterprise application integration is becoming even more difficult due to the explosive growth of various information systems as a result of ever increasing competition in the software market. This thesis aims to provide a novel solution to enterprise application integration. The semantic data model concept that evolved in database technology is revisited and applied to enterprise application integration. This has led to two novel ideas developed in this thesis. First, an ontology of an enterprise with five levels (following the data abstraction: generalization/specialization) is proposed and represented using unified modeling language. Second, both the ontology for the enterprise functions and the ontology for the enterprise applications are modeled to allow automatic processing of information back and forth between these two domains. The approach with these novel ideas is called the enterprise semantic model approach. The thesis presents a detailed description of the enterprise semantic model approach, including the fundamental rationale behind the enterprise semantic model, the ontology of enterprises with levels, and a systematic way towards the construction of a particular enterprise semantic model for a company. A case study is provided to illustrate how the approach works and to show the high potential of solving the existing problems within enterprise application integration

Steel industry restructuring and location

In this paper, we link technology-based competition, demand patterns, and managerial agency to describe and explain the process of restructuring in the American steel industry in terms of its economic geography and in the context of sweeping changes in the industry’s global structure. Between World War II and the end of the1960’s, the American steel industry was dominated by large integrated steel producers. During this period, competition was primarily among integrated firms and the location decisions taken during the period concerned individual production units within those firms. Between the 1970’s and the 1990’s, a new kind of competition re-shaped the economic geography of the American steel industry: employing scrap-based production methods, minimills emerged to challenge the integrated producers. Shifts in demand away from the previous geographical core combined with aggressive investments by minimill managers in production capacity and in capability upgrading to drive home the minimill advantage. Finally, with the turn of the century, world steel markets began to reshape based on globalization. Energized by liberalization and privatization in many parts of the world, and supported by information technology and managerial innovations that increased spans of control, steel firm managers employed aggressive mergers & acquisitions to create the first large-scale steel multinational corporations. During this period, consolidation redrew the boundaries of firm competition, and foreign steel firms emerged as owners of a major share of American steelmaking capacity. Moreover, increases in the world demand for steel and world steelmaking capacity had profound effect in reshaping the economic geography of the competitive landscape. By examining these critical periods of restructuring in the steel industry, the role of economic geography as a competitive factor is exposed, and context is provided for understanding the regional and spatial implications of competitive adjustment

Evaluation of Cementitious Injection Grouts for the Stabilization of Holly Tower Support Rock, Hovenweep National Monument

This thesis addresses the testing and evaluation of the use of a cementitious injection grout for the reattachment of detached slabbing on the sandstone support rock of Holly Tower at Hovenweep National Monument. This research follows on a previous condition assessment and diagnosis of the deterioration of the sandstone support rock and the effects of consolidation on the rock as the first step in a multi-phase conservation program. The extreme instability of the slabbing on the west side of the support rock requires remedial intervention that will retain and reattach the slab to the parent rock. Injection grouting was identified as a viable option for reattachment, requiring the development of an intensive testing regimen to determine the physical and mechanical properties of a commercial cementitious grout

DESIGN_OF_WPI_MIXED-USE_FACILITY_FOR_GATEWAY_PARK

The project investigated preliminary design layouts as well as structural frame and construction plan for Lot 3 commercial building of the Gateway Park expansion at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. A structural design, including an additional floor featuring an open-style conference center, was established following investigations of structural steel and reinforced concrete. Elements of the foundation system were also designed. A phased construction plan, project schedule and cost estimate were prepared and submitted as project deliverables

DESIGN OF WPI MIXED-USE FACILITY FOR GATEWAY PARK

The project investigated preliminary design layouts as well as structural frame and construction plan for Lot 3 commercial building of the Gateway Park expansion at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. A structural design, including an additional floor featuring an open-style conference center, was established following investigations of structural steel and reinforced concrete. Elements of the foundation system were also designed. A phased construction plan, project schedule and cost estimate were prepared and submitted as project deliverables

CONJURE: automatic generation of constraint models from problem specifications

Funding: Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EP/V027182/1, EP/P015638/1), Royal Society (URF/R/180015).When solving a combinatorial problem, the formulation or model of the problem is critical tothe efficiency of the solver. Automating the modelling process has long been of interest because of the expertise and time required to produce an effective model of a given problem. We describe a method to automatically produce constraint models from a problem specification written in the abstract constraint specification language Essence. Our approach is to incrementally refine the specification into a concrete model by applying a chosen refinement rule at each step. Any nontrivial specification may be refined in multiple ways, creating a space of models to choose from. The handling of symmetries is a particularly important aspect of automated modelling. Many combinatorial optimisation problems contain symmetry, which can lead to redundant search. If a partial assignment is shown to be invalid, we are wasting time if we ever consider a symmetric equivalent of it. A particularly important class of symmetries are those introduced by the constraint modelling process: modelling symmetries. We show how modelling symmetries may be broken automatically as they enter a model during refinement, obviating the need for an expensive symmetry detection step following model formulation. Our approach is implemented in a system called Conjure. We compare the models producedby Conjure to constraint models from the literature that are known to be effective. Our empirical results confirm that Conjure can reproduce successfully the kernels of the constraint models of 42 benchmark problems found in the literature.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Some problems in hot rolling of al-alloys solved by the finite element method

This thesis is focused on employing the finite element method (FEM) to simulate hot flat rolling process. The relevant work involves selecting a suitable constitutive equation, predicting the rolling load and roll torque, computing temperature changes and lateral deformation, simulating the evolution of substructure, modelling static recrystallisation and designing the rolling pass schedule. A practical pass schedule supplied by an aluminium company and containing reliable measured data of roll load and torque is analysed by a commercial 3-D thermornechanical coupled FEM program FORGE3 V5.3. The inverse analysis method is adopted to obtain the friction coefficient and heat transfer coefficient. The distribution of pressure, equivalent strain, the stress and damage in the roll gap in breakdown rolling are discussed. The changes of temperature and lateral profile under both laboratory and industrial rolling conditions are computed and compared with experimental measurements, the differences are then investigated. Through applying the Taguchi experimental design method, the influence of each rolling parameter on the spread, i. e. the ratio of width to thickness, the roll radius to thickness, the thickness reduction, and the deformation temperature, the relative contribution of each control parameter is quantitatively estimated and expressed as a percentage. A new spread formula is built up based on a large amount of FE analyses. The new formula is able to deal with both laboratory and industrial rolling conditions with high accuracy. Critical reviews are presented for the previous work in the modelling of subgrain size and static recrystallisation. Both empirical and physical models are applied to investigate the evolution of subgrain size, dislocation density, misorientation and the flow stress in the roll gap. The predicted subgrain size agrees very well with the experimental measurement. The difference between the use of two models are illustrated and analysed. Studies on modelling of static recrystallisation are carried out by incorporating the plastomechanical parameters, i. e. strain, strain rate and temperature, into empirical model. Various approaches are proposed to reduce the predicted volume fraction recrystallised at the surface and are verified by the comparison with measurement. Simulation results show that some of the previous work reported in the literature are erroneous. Further work in the modelling of static recrystallisation and texture evolution is detailed. The Taguchi experimental method is also applied to study the influence of the rolling parameters on the fraction recrystallised (Xv ). The study shows that rolling temperature has the greatest influence on the Xv, followed by the parameter H. 1L. The roll temperature and roll speed have little influence on the Xv. Designing a rational rolling pass schedule is critical for the control of strip profile and product quality. In the present thesis, the procedure of designing a rolling pass schedule is illustrated. The formulae used in scheduling are listed and explained. The scheduling program is then performed to check with two existing industrial schedules. The comparison shows that the rolling load, temperature and power model is reliable and shows high accuracy. A multipass simulation by the use of finite element method is also carried out and the results are compared with various model predictions. The problems in the simulation are illustrated and explained