Evaluation on the functional dimensions of the contextual integration at 'Kuala Lumpur Waterfront'

‘Kuala Lumpur Waterfront’ is a term that maybe unfamiliar to many. Kuala Lumpur is a city that originates at the confluence of two rivers, Klang and Gombak River. The waterfront used to be very busy with activities when it was once a trading post for the export of tin at the turn of last century . This was when the river was the lifeline of the city – its main mode of transportation. The activity at the waterfront has changed over the years with the change of social, economical and physical development of the city. Many waterfront cities throughout the world have gone through similar changes when the mode of transportation changed from water to motor system in their country. A number of cities have made efforts to integrate the cities’ activities with their water body. This research attempts to investigate the activities at the Kuala Lumpur waterfront within the city centre in terms of its level of contextual integration with the urban rivers in the current context. The technique adopted for this research is field observation which include building use survey and time interval observation to investigate the activities in ten demarcated zone along Kuala Lumpur waterfront within the city centre. The research concluded with the findings that all the zones exhibited medium level of contextual integration between the waterfront and the urban river in terms of its building use which depends much on the continuity of activities, their positioning location, accessibility and the provision of space and facilities

The Effect of Element Types on Force Analogy Method Analysis

In this study, the seismic performance of a 2D portal frame subjected to the recorded seismic ground motions of the Northridge 1994 earthquake was evaluated by the force analogy method (FAM) with different element types. To increase the accuracy of FAM, Timoshenko (TS) elements were employed instead of the classical Euler Bernoulli (EB) elements, to revert the shear deformations that are neglected in EB elements. To perform evaluation, the same material and section properties were considered and the same portal frame was analyzed with different element lengths, from 0.5 to 7.0 m in 0.5 m steps

Growth Linkage between Oil and Gas and Construction Industry of Malaysia (1991-2010)

Oil and gas sector has become very important and fundamental sector of any economy.  Oil and gas are essential and, high-value commodities for both developed and developing countries. These two products are indispensable for industry, industrial process, and industrial output. The demand for these commodities are continues to grow because of their various use and direct link to the industry and social well-being of the society.  The two characteristics high consumption and high value increases the hopes and expectations of governments, citizens, local communities, and the oil and gas companies that provide the essential services of exploration, extraction, and distribution. The construction sector play significant role to manage these activities. The objective of this study is to describe and identify the causal link and the direction of the link between the Malaysian construction industry (MCI)  and oil and gas sector (O&G) of Malaysia over the period of 1991 to 2010. The Granger causality technique is used to determine the effect of one sector to another sector. The outcome of the study is neither O&G lead to MCI nor MCI lead to O&G. The O&G and MCI are independent and there is no causality link between them during study period 1991-2010. Keywords: Linkage, causality

A morphological analysis of the waterfront in city centre, Kuala Lumpur

The increasing concern for a sustainable development and the significance it should have on future waterfront, places urban design - with its key concern for contextual integration – in a uniquely important position. One of the main factors in contextual integration is the morphological evolution of the place. This paper focuses upon the case study analysing the morphology of Kuala Lumpur waterfront by adopting the method developed by Conzen (1960). Three significant periods of the waterfront development were examined and through this, nineteen waterfront treatments were identified which are suggested vital to be ackowledged for future decision making on the Kuala Lumpur waterfront

A Novel Algorithm for Effective Vibration Control of Portal Frames

Severe vibrations such as earthquakes threaten to demolish or cause damage to built structures during their lifetime. Mitigation of such damage can be done by using control devices such as actuators. In this paper, an algorithm is proposed to analyze the nonlinear behavior of a portal frame supported by an actuator. The results were compared with those for a frame without actuator. The algorithm was developed in accordance with the Timoshenko beam element theory. ANSYS verified the results for the cases of a frame supported by a damper element and a frame without actuator. The results support the efficiency of the algorithm in reducing frame vibration and top-node displacement

The contextual integration and sustainable development of Kuala Lumpur’s City Centre waterfront: an evaluation of the policies, law and guidelines

The contextual integration between the water bodies, waterfront and the city has long been established in history when water used to be the main transportation mode. The importance of the integration of water bodies to many cities is globally acknowledged. Over the years, many of these cities have lost their integration with their water bodies due to many factors such as the industrial revolution, development in transportation system and technology. In an attempt to achieve sustainable development, most cities have attempted to reintegrate the city with the water body even to the extent of removing highways which had been constructed parallel to the water body. These expensive approaches are some of the many efforts done due to the increasing awareness on the benefits gained through waterfront regeneration. This has, however, helped to secure the sense of place as well as increasing the quality of living and working environment of the urban community. The lost of integration between the city and the water bodies is also experienced by the capital city of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur. In the case of Kuala Lumpur city, the Klang and Gombak Rivers that run through the city centre act as the main water bodies. It used to be the life lines of the City when it was the main transportation mode for the people. It was from the rivers and the waterfront area that the morphological development of the city evolves. There are also attempts to reintegrate the rivers to the city since 1979. Based on a qualitative method, this paper employs content analysis and focus interview as the research tools to evaluate existing policies and guidelines available on the contextual integration between the waterfront and the urban river. This paper provides the six main findings which directly contributed to the existing contextual integration between the waterfront and the water bodies. These are i)absence of policy and guidelines before the third morphological period ii) existing policies and guidelines are general and mostly referring to zones rather than according to plots iii) Policy and guideline developed and implemented in isolation by different government agencies iv) lack of guidelines which is suitable to the Kuala Lumpur waterfront. v) lack of detail master planning for Kuala Lumpur waterfront vi) guidelines which are not legally bounded are making implementation difficult. These aspects are important to be underlined so that they are clearly identified, acknowledged and overcome for a more sustainable development of the waterfront in the city centre of Kuala Lumpur

Investigating the Awareness of Onsite Mechanization in Malaysian Construction Industry

AbstractThe Malaysian construction industry is vital for the country economy and always played a key role towards the development of national infrastructure. The ever-increasing market competitiveness and the widespread adoption of Industrialized Building System (IBS) by the local contractors derive the industry to improve the existing processes for achieving higher levels of quality and products. This transition from traditional methods of construction give a momentum to the deployment of onsite mechanized equipments. The utilization of mechanized equipments increases construction productivity and as well as reduces the dependency on foreign labour. However, a large amount of construction company's capital is also invested in procuring these equipments. In addition to this, varieties of construction equipments are also required for carrying out these operations. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to investigate the current awareness and application of onsite mechanization in Malaysian construction industry. A questionnaire survey was conducted among a classified group of Construction Industry Development Board of Malaysia (CIDB) G7 Class ‘A’ contractors. The results of the survey show that there is a good understanding of Malaysian contractors towards mechanization. It is also revealed that the adoption of IBS have a direct correlation with the usage of onsite machineries and equipments. Results further indicate that excavation, earthworks, pilling works and structural works have high utilization of mechanized construction equipments. The study will help to find out the existing level of mechanization practices in Malaysian construction industry

Global Transcriptomic Responses of Roseithermus sacchariphilus Strain RA in Media Supplemented with Beechwood Xylan

The majority of the members in order Rhodothermales are underexplored prokaryotic extremophiles. Roseithermus, a new genus within Rhodothermales, was first described in 2019. Roseithermus sacchariphilus is the only species in this genus. The current report aims to evaluate the transcriptomic responses of R. sacchariphilus strain RA when cultivated on beechwood xylan. Strain RA doubled its growth in Marine Broth (MB) containing xylan compared to Marine Broth (MB) alone. Strain RA harbors 54 potential glycosyl hydrolases (GHs) that are affiliated with 30 families, including cellulases (families GH 3, 5, 9, and 44) and hemicellulases (GH 2, 10, 16, 29, 31,43, 51, 53, 67, 78, 92, 106, 113, 130, and 154). The majority of these GHs were upregulated when the cells were grown in MB containing xylan medium and enzymatic activities for xylanase, endoglucanase, β-xylosidase, and β-glucosidase were elevated. Interestingly, with the introduction of xylan, five out of six cellulolytic genes were upregulated. Furthermore, approximately 1122 genes equivalent to one-third of the total genes for strain RA were upregulated. These upregulated genes were mostly involved in transportation, chemotaxis, and membrane components synthesis

Effects of cutter geometry and cutting parameters on machining Al/SiC Metal Matrix Composites (MMC)

Al/SiC Metal Matrix Composite (MMC) have now become one of the prominent materials in composite materials especially in automotive industry. It has gained tremendous demand due to their tailored properties such as lightweight, high strength and wear resistant. However, these materials are classified as poor machinability material due to the presence of the hard-abrasive reinforcement particles within the matrix. Moreover, the lack of commercialization of a specific cutting tool for machining MMC materials is the source of several inherent problems such as rough machined surface and high cutting temperature. Furthermore, most of the researches on machining MMC are merely focus only on the effect of cutting parameters. Addressing to this matter, the development of new cutter design specifically for machining MMC are necessitate. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to study the combined effect between cutter geometrical features (helix angles, rake angles, clearance angles, number of flutes) and cutting parameter (cutting speed, feed rate and depth of cut) towards the machining performances namely surface roughness, cutting force and material removal rate. From the conducted experimental work, it was found that all of the considered factors has significant effect on the machining performances. As a conclusion, the obtained relationship between the responses with the cutter geometrical features and machining parameters can be used for the development of new cutter design specifically for machining Al/SiC MMC material

Performance of Wire-EDM Parameters on Machining Characteristics of Titanium Alloy (Ti6Al4V) using Taguchi Method

The effect of wire electrical discharge machining (wire-EDM) parameters on machining characteristics of Titanium Alloy (Ti6Al4V) is studied. 0.2mm diameter of electrolytic brass wire having composition ratio Copper and Zinc 60:40 was selected as wire electrode. The experiment was done using SODICK VZ500L wire-EDM machine. Orthogonal arrays design of Taguchi method was applied to design the experimental matrix and the data was analyzed using analysis of variance (ANOVA). It is found that the most significant parameter affected material removal rate (MRR) is servo voltage followed by pulse duration, while pulse interval shows the less significant factor. The validation of optimum parameter has been done for MRR and it is found that after optimization process, the MRR can reach up to 0.044g/min, which is a 4.76% increased as compared to maximum MRR result from initial experiment. Surface roughness (RA) reduces to 4.35% meanwhile kerf width (Kw) slightly increases to 0.036% after conformation run of the optimization combination process parameters. Pulse duration of input parameter of gives the most significant impact to RA and Kw. Thus, it shows that the results of wire-EDM on Ti6Al4V are particularly useful for industrial practitioners and researchers to determine the best combination of parameters which lead to optimize the machining performance