The role of the gift wrap stall at christmas

The pressure to wrap a gift can cause anxiety for the giver. At Christmas, many shopping centres have gift wrap stalls to assist their customers with the wrapping. In this paper we explore the purpose of a gift wrap stall and the role it plays in Christmas gift shopping. Data were collected through observation as it allowed insights into the phenomena that could not otherwise be obtained. Findings include the nature of a gift wrap stall, the mood surrounding the gift wrap stall, the types of gifts wrapped, the level of decision making involved, the role of the staff and issues relating to trust, the waiting times for gift wrapping, the giver&rsquo;s gift wrap skills, and enquiries into the gift wrap service. This research makes an insightful contribution to a novel topic in the field of consumer behaviour as it allows us to better understand gift wrapping and its role in gift exchange.<br /

To wrap or not to wrap? What is expected? Some initial findings from a study of gift wrapping

This paper aims to explore and discuss the expectations surrounding the decision to wrap a gift. Gift wrapping can enable an object to be turned into a gift through the development of meaning that symbolises it as a gift. There are two key expectations surrounding the use of gift wrapping. The first expectation is that receivers prefer gifts to be wrapped and the second expectation is that the gift meets individual and social expectations of what a gift should look like. Data was gathered using three qualitative techniques; observation, interviews and projective workshops. These initial findings form part of a larger research study into gift wrapping.<br /

Modelling and heuristic control of a parallel hybrid electric vehicle

Hybrid electric vehicles offer the potential for fuel consumption improvements when compared with conventional vehicle powertrains. The fuel consumption benefits which can be realised when utilising the hybrid electric vehicle architecture are dependent on how much braking energy is regenerated, and how well the regenerated energy is utilised. A number of power management strategies have been proposed in literature. Owing to the prospect of real-time implementation, many of these proposals have centred on the use of heuristics. Despite the research advances made, the key challenge with heuristic strategies remains achieving reasonable fuel savings without over-depleting the battery’s state of charge at the end of the trip. In view of this challenge, this paper offers two main contributions to existing energy management literature. The first is a novel, simple but effective heuristic control strategy which employs a tuneable parameter (the percentage of the maximum motor tractive power) to decide the control sequence, such that impressive fuel savings are achieved without over-depleting the final state of charge of the battery (the battery energy). The second is the quantitative exploration of braking patterns and its impact on kinetic energy regeneration. The potential of the proposed heuristic control strategy was explored over a range of driving cycles which reflect different driving scenarios. The results from this analysis show that fuel savings of as much as 19.07% can be achieved over the Japan 10–15 driving cycle. In comparison with a suboptimal controller whose control signals were derived from dynamic programming optimal control, our proposed strategy was found to be outperforming, in that it achieved impressive real-time fuel savings without much penalty to the final state of charge of the battery. Gentle braking patterns were also found to significantly improve brake energy regeneration by the electric motor. </jats:p

Extended Minimum Copper Loss Range Fault-Tolerant Control for Dual Three-Phase PMSM

This paper studies the single open-circuit failure (OCF) in dual three-phase permanent magnet synchronous motors (DT-PMSM) in transport electrification where wide speed range and torque operation range (TOR) are required. A new control scheme is proposed to extend the TOR with minimum copper loss based on the well-established fault-tolerant control strategy minimum loss (ML) and maximum torque (MT). The ML strategy allows the demanded torque at the reference speed to be delivered with minimum copper loss. The MT strategy presents wider torque capability in post-fault operation without exceeding the current limit, whilst copper loss within the stator winding is not optimized. However, there is a gap in the permissible TOR of these two strategies. A simple switch of strategy, from ML to MT when the limit of ML’s TOR is reached, would result in excessive copper loss. The proposed full-torque-operation-range minimum loss (FTOR-ML) in this paper is proposed to mitigate the excessive copper loss. The novel FTOR-ML for the DT-PMSM under OCF for different winding configurations, single (1N) and isolated neutral point (2N), combines the merit of ML and MT where the entire TOR of MT is achieved with minimum copper loss. The analytical solution of FTOR-ML is derived in this paper for both winding configurations. Experimental result demonstrates the combined merit and effectiveness of the proposed control scheme

The potential of catalysed exhaust gas recirculation to improve high-load operation in spark ignition engines

Within the literature, there are a number of studies investigating the benefits of exhaust gas recirculation, and as a result it has become established as a promising technology for combustion control to allow engine downsizing technology to be advanced. Aside from the dilution effect of exhaust gas recirculation, some of the components, such as NO, CO, and hydrocarbons, can have significant chemical effects. The literature shows that the component within exhaust gas recirculation which has the largest chemical effect on combustion is NO, which can promote or inhibit the onset of autoignition causing reactions within the end gas at high load. The reduction in NOx gases in catalysed exhaust gas recirculation can increase the knock limit at high load, with some authors reporting up to a 5∘ crank angle improvement in combustion phasing. There is conflicting evidence on whether this translates to an improvement in fuel consumption, with one study finding a decrease of up to 2% comparing to another finding an increase of 1.5%-3.5%. Crude calculations on the emissions of a 2.0-L direct injection spark ignition engine operating at high load show that in an extreme case the reduction in the calorific value of the inlet charge due to catalysis of the recirculated gases can be up to 4.5%. Despite the potential benefits, the literature on catalysed exhaust gas recirculation is fairly limited and the evidence seems so far inconclusive as to whether this technology may have the potential to further enhance the benefits of exhaust gas recirculation. This article uses current literature to ascertain the potential benefits of catalysed exhaust gas recirculation, compare to pre-catalyst exhaust gas recirculation, and investigates its individual components in more detail to explain how chemical interactions can either promote or inhibit ignition depending on their concentration and temperature. </jats:p