Table of contents

Preface The 1^st IPCME2018

The 1^st International Postgraduate Conference on Mechanical Engineering (IPCME2018) is the first conference organized by Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Universiti Malaysia Pahang, Pekan campus that focus on participation of postgraduate student across the world. These proceeding contains the selected scientific manuscripts submitted to the conference. It is with great pleasure to welcome you to the "International Postgraduate Conference on Mechanical Engineering IPCME2018" that is held at Universiti Malaysia Pahang, Malaysia. The call for papers attracted submissions of over more than one hundred abstracts from both local and international universities.

The scientific papers published in these proceeding have been revised and approved by the technical committee of the 1^st IPCME2018. All of the papers exhibit clear, concise, and precise expositions that appeal to a broad international readership interested in mechanical engineering. The topics of the Conference were: (1) Combustion; (2) Structural integrity and vibration; (3) Human and biomechanical; (4) Manufacturing system and process; (5) Energy and fuels; (6) Computational analysis and advanced materials; and (7) Thermal and fluid engineering.

The reports present original ideas or results of general significant supported by clear reasoning and compelling evidence, and employ methods, theories and practices relevant to the research. The authors state clearly the questions and the significance of their research to theory and practice, describe how the research contributes to new knowledge, and provide tables and figures that meaningfully add to the narrative. In this edition of IPCME2018 representatives coming from academia, industry, governmental and private sectors. The plenary and invited speakers present, discuss, promote, and disseminate research in all fields of mechanical engineering in a constructive manner. Numerous social events that provide opportunities for the participants to renew old contacts and establish new ones were scheduled to accompany and follow the scientific activities.

We want to thank the Organizing Committee, the University and Sponsors supporting the conference and everyone who contributed along the conference and publication of these proceeding.

Professor Dr. Rizalman Mamat

The Chairman of IPCME2018

All papers published in this volume of IOP Conference Series: Materials Science and Engineering have been peer reviewed through processes administered by the proceedings Editors. Reviews were conducted by expert referees to the professional and scientific standards expected of a proceedings journal published by IOP Publishing.

Paraffin deposition in the crude oil production pipeline has been an alarming problem to the flow assurance community. This phenomenon causes a tremendous amount of material loss in the production and substantial resources are expended to resolve these flow assurance problems—which included the chemical treatment. This study examined an agricultural non-ionic silane-based surfactant and its blends (with silica nanoparticles) as a flow improver using Malaysian light crude oil (42.4°API). In particular, this study performed the following experimental measurements: wax appearance temperature, pour point, viscosity, and FTIR spectroscopic analysis. The result showed that the surfactant-nanoparticles blend affected the viscosity (significant reduction by approximately 67 %) within certain temperature range and were able to depress both pour point (to 4°C) and wax appearance temperature (15.6°C). It was also revealed that the most potent blend consisted 400 ppm of silane-based surfactant and 200 ppm of SiO₂ nanoparticles. The study also evaluated the underlying mechanisms for the variation of viscosity through FTIR spectroscopic analysis.

In this work, natural composite is made from core of Albizia wood and matrix of ramie fiber. Hand lay-up method is applied to fabricate the composite. Albizia-Ramie composite are made in different ramie layer, i.e. single layer and double layer. The aim of this work is to investigate an effect of core pre-heating and resin type on mechanical properties of the composites. For each variation, 5 samples are tested in Universal Testing Machine and the average of bending stress, bending strain, and Modulus elasticity of the composites are analyzed. The result shows that the use of Albizia pre-heating and Epoxy resin improves the properties of bending stress and stress of the Albizia-Ramie composites.

This project presents an experimental work on vortex-induced vibration (VIV) of a short rigid cylinder to obtain its dynamic responses in cross-flow directions with different cylinder surface roughness. In order to enable the rigid cylinder to suspend and vibrate freely upon excitation of wind speed, a supporting structure has been designed and fabricated. This paper aims to investigate the effect of cylinder surface roughness on the characteristics of VIV. The surface roughness was differentiated by using two grade sizes of sandpapers. This self-designed experiments were conducted using Wind Blower at Aeronautical and Wind Engineering Laboratory (AEROLAB), UTM Kuala Lumpur. By using the accelerometer, the raw amplitude readings were recorded and processed using LMS TestXpress 12 software. The data was recorded in the range from 1 m/s to 8 m/s of wind speed, with an interval of 1 m/s. Analysis on the data in terms of amplitude and frequency responses was conducted to identify the effect of cylinder surface roughness on the characteristics of VIV. The lock-in region is found at the low reduced velocity range, where the amplitude value is slightly higher. At Vr=8 lock in phenomena is occurred. From the results obtained, the amplitude increases as the vortex shedding frequency close to the natural frequency of the cylinder, where the frequency ratio =1. Amplitude reduction is found to be 86.7% and 3.43% for the highest and middle surface roughness respectively. The higher the surface roughness, the higher the amplitude reduction.

Decision-making is crucial in the industry as the industrial expert having a restriction to convey their experience to the management prior to the final decision-making (DM). Daily operation in the industry especially in the automotive environment a lot of DM is required. Industry issue such as making decision of sub-assembly parts and module production location is one of the industry problem. The objectives of this study to establish a method to measure the intuitive opinions and experiences of the industrial expert for the DM proposal. Simple qualitative measurement would benefit to engineer to make a proposal to the management with the quantitative result. Intuition of the expert would conveyed to the decision maker in the industry to reach a decision on the proposal. Based on the criteria, sub-criteria and alternatives established, the computation using analytical hierarchy process (AHP) methodology applied in this study. The result of alternative 3 is 0.399, which is the processes will be outsource at the local component manufacturer location and transport to the automotive carmaker. The weighted factor in conclusion achieved the consistency with a CR ≤ 0.1, which is 0.07. Alternative 3 agreed by all related party in the industry as the best option for sub-assembly process of parts and modules in order to meet local contents strategy. The AHP methodology proven for usage as the appropriate tool for decision making in the industry.

Single-Minute Exchange of Die (SMED) is a popular method used to optimize the die change processing time. The purpose of this study is to identify on how to reduce set-up time by using Embedded SMED in automotive stamping press line. An actual case study at an automotive company XYZ in Malaysia was conducted based on parts supply issues. The observations, assessments and standard manufacturing practices were carried out during the study. WITNESS simulation software was used to identify the critical processes and also enable the validation of actual output based on the production. The result of the particular press line (combination of 800 Tons and 500 Tons machines) which produced 6 parts in 1-shift operations with small lot size output has been identified and improved. The significant improvement based on the Embedded SMED compared to conventional SMED approach showed a decreasing change-over time from an average of 12.51 minutes to 9.41 minutes (effectively a single-digit minute) resulting in circa 62% reduction.

Projection mask stereolithography is a latest technology in 3D printing industry. It relies on UV projection to cure the photocurable resin layer-by-layer to build the solid 3D object. The projections are generated from tessellated STL CAD model using contour generation algorithm that generates 2D contours as the projection mask. The computational of the algorithm consumes a lot of memory for high-resolution printing. Low-resolution causes the stair-case effect to visibly appear on the printed model. Using real-time contour generation algorithm reduces the memory consumption and retains the high-resolution printing quality and accuracy. Pixel line mapping algorithm is implemented on the generated line segments to scale the line segments with respect to the display resolution of the projection device. Contour loop algorithm connects each of these pixel line segments into multiple closed-loop contours. The algorithms are implemented on an Alien STL model having 150350 facets. It is found that the pixel mapping algorithm correctly scales the model while retaining the aspect ratio of the model. The result of contour loop algorithm shows that the mean contour loop execution time is 0.87 milliseconds which is relevant for real-time application.

In this study, the effect of copper and carbon nanotubes (CNT) composition on interfacial growth of various Sn-Ag-Cu (SAC) solder joints were investigated. SAC is proven to have good reliability and mechanical properties but lacking in terms of melting point and wettability. Thus, Sn-4.0 wt%Ag-0.3wt%Cu (SAC403) and Sn-4.0 wt%Ag-0.7 wt%Cu (SAC407) were reinforced with CNT with various weight percentages of 0 to 0.1wt%. The wetting angle and intermetallic compound (IMC) thickness is measured using optical microscope (Olympus BX5/M) and Olympus Stream Essentials software. The high Cu content alloys formed a long Cu₆Sn₅ whisker which act as an obstacle to crack propagation. CNT improves wettability and IMC layer growth for both SAC403 and SAC407 by lowering the wetting angle and IMC thickness compared to the plain solder.

Very few studies have examined the connection between both intellectual capital (IC) with natural environment called as green intellectual capital (GIC). Regrettably, poor attention are given on GIC among both academicians and practitioners. This absence factor of natural environment can be acceptable in the past, but nowadays the natural environment become major challenge in the achievement of competitive advantage. More specifically, competitive advantage strategies in the current and future highly depends on the resources and capabilities that ease activity of environmental friendly. This approach arguing that the natural environment become a new and business opportunities and organisations that are willing to change their business operation to these challenges will obtain the economy's survival in the future. Therefore, this study intends to report on the perceptions of manufacturing SMEs in Malaysia on GIC. There are eighteen variables on GIC that formed a part of a questionnaire using a seven-point interval scale. A total of 168 respondents returned the questionnaires and was analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) approach. The results of the study revealed that the existence of green human capital (GHC) and green relational capital (GRC) in the organisation. Nonetheless, green structural capital (GSC) become lowest factors among three dimensions of GIC.

This paper provides an overview of the pressure vessel, starting with its background and a brief history. Then, the geometry, main components, classification, applications, materials and fabrication process of the pressure vessel are also discussed. When designing or performing optimization on the vessel, it is crucial for the designers to familiar with the types of failures and loadings, to select appropriate analytical methods to analyse the vessel. As well as the design parameters such as thickness, design pressure or allowable stresses, which can alter the performance, efficiency and safety of the vessel. Since the design of the pressure vessel is governed by the codes and standards, some of the commonly used codes are presented, with more details included for the ASME pressure vessel code.

Malaysia is hot and humid country with high temperature and humidity. The air conditioning systems that have huge energy consumption are an essential component in daily life. The aims of this research are to build a building thermal HVAC model, which could predict the amount of energy consumption required to get the comfort level using eQUEST and purpose energy saving methods. In the model the different physical properties of the building, weather, and internal load, HVAC system, operating strategies and schedules taken to account. From the result, huge energy used for space cooling resulting low room temperature outside the range of Malaysian Standard MS1525. Among the purposed method, packaged VAV DX coil air conditioning system has the most energy saving on the building's overall energy consumption following by roof and wall insulation (24°C) indoor temperature, standard VAV CW coil air conditioning system, and daylight control with low e glass. The energy reduction range from 6.0% to 21.2%. This study are significant to study and improve the building energy efficiency.

Prediction of fatigue crack growth is one of the vital issues to prevent catastrophic failure from damage tolerance perspective. The surface of crack shape usually in semi-elliptical that maintained during the whole propagation. The investigation of this paper is to illustrate the surface crack growth that subjected to fatigue loading. The four-point bending and three-point bending have been simulated by using the S-version Finite Element Model (S-FEM). The simulation is conducted for aluminium alloys A7075-T6 and A2017-T3 with all of the parameters based on the previous experiment. The semi-elliptical crack shape is applied during the simulation process to represent with the reality of crack growth phenomena. Paris' Law model approach is presented in fatigue crack growth simulation. The S-FEM produced the surface crack growth and fatigue life prediction. The results of the S-FEM prediction then compared with the previous experiments. The results presented in a graph for comparison between S-FEM prediction with the experimental results. The S-FEM results obtained is good agreement with the experiment results.

Problems rising in the process of moving grain sacks in rice milling in Malang, there was a monotonous work activities and it was still handled without tools. In one day, the workers' average of moving grain sack was 82 and the distance between the place of weighing and grinding was as far as 11 meters and the weight of the grain sacks moved was 40 kg_s. To do working posture analysis to the rice miling workers, Rapid Upper Limb Assessment (RULA) and Rapid Entire Body Assessment (REBA) methods were used. The results of the observation and calculation of working posture by using RULA method on a stage of lifting sack obtained score 7 with high risk level, and on a stage of carrying sack obtained score 7 with high risk level. The results of the observation and calculation of working posture by using REBA method on a stage of lifting sack obtained score 8 with high risk level, and on a stage of carrying sack obtained score 10 with high risk level. Based on the results of the calculation using REBA and RULA methods, immediate repairs on the transfer process of grain sacks of rice miling in Malang was needed.

Energy efficiency has become an important issue in manufacturing industry, since it is one of the biggest energy consumers in the world. Despite the importance of energy efficiency, it is much obvious that the research in assembly sequence that focus on environmental aspect is still lacking. In Assembly Sequence Planning (ASP), the research on problem optimization is mainly demanded for the effective computational approach to determine the best assembly sequence. This paper presents a case study from an electronic product assembly that considers the energy utilization during assembly process. In particular, the case study focuses to reduce the idle energy utilization in assembly process. The case study was optimized using newly proposed Moth-Flame Optimization (MFO) and then being compared with well-frequent used algorithms including Ant Colony Optimization (ACO), Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO), and Genetic Algorithm (GA). The result of the computational experiment test was divided into comparison of assembly layout between MFO proposed layout and existing layout. Besides, the statistical test involving Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and post-hoc test of Fisher's Least Significant Difference (LSD) were then conducted. The proposed MFO performed better in terms of the best minimum fitness (0.401681), average fitness (0.415308), standard deviation of fitness (0.022601), with appropriate computational time and power consumed. In meantime, the results also indicated that the case study was suitable in the development of energy efficient model for ASP.

Assembly line balancing (ALB) problem has evolved in lined with the manufacturing advancement. Previous research in ALB mostly assumed that all workstations are having similar capabilities including the machines, tools and worker skills. Recently, researchers started to consider the ALB with resource constraint (ALB-RC) such as machine and worker. This paper aim to evaluate new rank-based crossovers to optimize real-life ALB-RC problem. Prior to this work, the authors had proposed rank-based crossover type I and II (RBC-I and II) to enhance the performance of Genetic Algorithm (GA) in optimizing ALB-RC problem. An industrial case study has been conducted in electronics industry. The results of industrial case study confirmed that the proposed ALB-RC model is capable to be used for the real industrial problem. At the same time, the result indicated that the GA with rank-based crossover is capable to optimize real-life problem. As a comparison, the number of workstation, resources and workers had reduced between 10 – 15% for the optimised layout using GA with RBC, compared with the original layout in the case study problem

Many organisations is force to reconfigure their business process to sustain themselves in competitive business environment. Business is sustainable is when organisation enable to balance between economic and social aspects without damaging environmental throughout their business operations. In order to achieve the desired end of sustainability, organisation need to keep themselves updates and learn about business environment in which they operate. The objective of this study is to examine the relationship between organizational learning capability and business sustainability. 168 managers of manufacturing SMEs participated in this study and data were analysed using Smart PLS 3.0 approach. The findings showed that organizational learning capability have significantly positive relationship with business sustainability.

This study aimed to devisea new design of domestic waste treatment which can produce an output of class IV water (irrigation water) based on measurement of TDS (Total Dissolved Solid) and TSS (Total Suspended Solid) parameters. The physical model tested in this research wasa stratified filter consisting of compositionsfrom coarse to fine materialsnamely gravel, charcoal and sand. Furthermore, filtering blackwater waste was refined by remediation with Cattail (Typha Angustifolia) and Vetiver (Vetiveria Zizanoides). The physical model of WWTP was set to 1:25 added by a stratified filter in the upstream section. Observations were done by measuring blackwater TDS levels prior to treatment, after going through a stratified filter, and after going through a remediation process with aquatic plants. The results showed that stratified filters and wetland can reduce TDS levels in blackwater until it reached the standard for irrigation water.

In the modern ages, many researches have been conducted to search for alternative fuel. Various source of alternative fuel such as palm, jathropa and rapeseed that are classified as biofuel have been tested to determine its suitability. Besides that, waste product such as waste tyres and plastics also can be processed to yield the alternative fuel. In this paper, performance of a diesel engine operating with tyre-derived fuel (TDF) blended with diesel fuel at several ratios is analysed and compared with diesel fuel. A single cylinder YANMAR TF120M diesel engine is utilized in the experiments where it is operated with constant load exerted to the engine and at variable engine speed ranging from 1200 rpm to 2400 rpm. The performance parameters that was analysed in the paper includes engine power and torque, combustion pressure and exhaust gas temperature. The experimental results show that percentage of TDF blends of 10% in diesel fuel gives significant impact to the engine performance output.

Municipal solid waste incineration produces non-combustible by-product known as bottom ash. Increase in waste production leads to increase in bottom ash, which raises environmental concerns and management issues. With the parameters and properties of bottom ash are in close agreement with those of aggregates used in concrete making, bottom ash has been adopted for reutilization in civil engineering. However, the workability of the concrete made with partial substitution of aggregate with bottom ash from local municipal solid waste incinerator has never been addressed. This paper aims to evaluate the performance and properties of concrete cube made with partial substitution of aggregate with bottom ash from Pulau Pangkor municipal solid waste incinerator in Perak. The content of bottom ash substitution in concrete cube made in this study were varied at 10, 20 and 30 percent of aggregate. All samples were tested for its workability, water absorption, compressive strength, and resistant towards fire. It was found that the performance of concrete with partial substitution of aggregate with bottom ash reduced with increased in substitution content in all aspects. However, the performance of the concrete with 10 percent bottom ash substitution to aggregate was acceptable and closed to that of control concrete. It has been demonstrated through this study that the use of bottom ash as partial substitution of aggregate in concrete making is possible at very low content. However, there are huge needs of further enhancement in manufacturing methodology in order to produce concrete with partial substitution of aggregate with bottom ash that outperform – or in closed agreement with – the control concrete.

In this study, the effect of nickel (Ni) addition on the microstructure and corrosion resistance properties of porous alumina (Al₂O₃) composites shaped with sugarcane bagasse pore-forming agent were evaluated. Plain and Ni-reinforced porous alumina sampels (Al₂O₃-xNi-RH; x = 2, 4, 6 and 8wt%) were prepared using the powder metallurgy method. Experimental results showed that the porosity (50.4-57.1vol%) and the pore size (62-109µm) of the porous alumina composites increased with rising content of Ni reinforcement. The XRD results showed that the Al₂O₃ matrix and Ni reinforcement reacted during the heat treatment process to produce nickel aluminate (NiAl₂O₄) spinel. Corrosion resistance results showed that the porous alumina composites exhibited better chemical stability in strong alkali solution as compared with strong acid solution.

In this article, the effect of sintering temperature was studied on the microstructure and hardness of cemented tungsten carbide and steel bilayer fabricated via the powder metallurgy route. Cemented tungsten carbide was reinforced with Fe and also used as the base material for the other layer to ensure compatibility between layers. Carbon addition was varied in the steel part composition to avoid carbon-deficient bilayer samples. Optical images revealed cracks at the interface which opened up more in bilayer samples sintered at 1295°C due to high mismatch in strain rate and excessive diffusion rate. Increase in sintering temperature turned grain particles coarser and lead to a decline in hardness values while increase in carbon addition enhanced densification and progressively increased hardness. Hardness values measured far away from the interface were observed higher than those close to the interface due to the formation of weak bond at the interface.

Each vehicle has a different beltline outer (BLO) system mainly focuses at the endcap. The endcap at the BLO will tend to detach after the usage of 3 months. The BLO is important in terms of protecting the car from certain effects. Those effects are wind, heard from inside of the car during high speed moving, and water infiltrate into cabin during heavy raining. The sound can affect the driver's mood while driving and the infiltrated water will damage the electronic parts at the door panel. One common material used for BLO is thermoplastic olefin (TPO). The purpose of this research is to investigate the effect of air resistance angle towards the endcap of BLO. This study concerns on the resulting stress distributions and total displacement. BLO of Proton Perdana model was drafted using Solidwork 2013 software to develop the finite element model for the endcap thus run through Abaqus 6.12 simulation software. In conclusion, the results will be a guideline for other studies in improving the mechanical strength and durability of the endcap to hold its position at the

The foundry physical properties of carbon nanotube (CNT) reinforced silica refractory ceramic nanocomposites have been determined. The pristine CNTs (pCNTs) were acid treated and subsequently dispersed in distilled water to achieve a stable suspension of functionalized CNTs (fCNTs). The as-prepared suspension, natural crystalline powdered quartz (SiO₂) and calcium oxide-clay; as binder and sintering aids (SA); stabilizer and mineralizer were mixed thoroughly by ultrasonication/ball milling, dried, cold compacted and densified by pressureless sintering consolidation technique via modified conventional powder processing. The comparable bulk density obtained for the sintered SiO₂-xfCNT-SA; x = 0, 0.01, 1 and 4 wt.% blends is an evidence of a complete densification and good homogenous dispersion of CNTs in the green matrices, thus better thermo-mechanical properties of the nanocomposites. Low linear/diametric expansion (1.37/1.57 ± 0.01%), high bulk density (1.735 ± 0.010g/cm³), moderate apparent porosity (41.28 ± 0.41%) and cold crushing strength (177 ± 9 kg/cm²), and higher thermal shock cycles (7 ± 1 cycles) of 1 wt. % fCNT-silica nanocomposite brick as compared to those of monolithic conventional silica brick signified the possibility of potential application of CNT as an additive in conventional green silica refractory mixture for better foundry physical properties.

The present study has dwelled on the implementation and evaluation of an artificial intelligence model for the determination of predicted foundry physical properties; linear expansion, bulk density, apparent porosity, thermal shock resistance cycles and cold crushing strength of carbon nanotube (CNT) reinforced silica refractory nanocomposite. A multi input and multi output Artificial Neural Network (ANN) models were developed using the Levenberg Marquardt Back Propagation algorithm (LMBPA) in the neural network toolbox of MATLAB R2015a to train/predict the foundry physical properties of the CNT-silica refractory nanocomposite bricks obtained experimentally from the previous study. The predicted models were compared with the experimental test results in order to evaluate the power and the accuracy of the artificial intelligence model for the characterization of the entire series of CNT-silica refractory nanocomposite bricks. The developed (LMBPA ANN) model satisfactorily predicts the foundry physical properties of CNT reinforced silica nanocomposite with a coefficient of determination (R²) in the range 0.75 ≥ R² ≤ 1.

Blackwater is a type of domestic wastewater that must be processed before discharge into the river. This study uses gravel, sand, and charcoal as filtration materials which arranged from coarse to fine, and also wetland system using Vetiver grass (Vetiveria zizanioides) and Cattail (Typha angustifolia). The treatment process is obtained by applying different treatments related to the sand thickness and blackwater residence time in the wetland. The focus of observation is emphasized on the measurement of BOD (Biological oxygen demand) and COD (Chemical oxygen demand). Both parameters measured and compared with the standard of water for agricultural purposes (Grade IV) regulated by Indonesian Government. The results showed that stratified filters can reduce the levels of BOD and COD effectively. The final results obtained after blackwater flowed through the wetland tube shows that BOD and COD levels have yet to meet the standard of grade IV water, although the overall result indicated the significant reduction of both parameters. This can be related to the input of organic matter from wetland itself, and it also can be considered an indication that blackwater treatment requires longer residence time.

Mode shape curvature based damage detection capable to detect damage in structure with high sensitivity. Sparse and high density mode shape displacement data obtained experimentally pose difficulties for mode shape curvature algorithm to quantify damage size accurately. The objective of this study is to compare damage detection sensitivity of different mode shape curvature algorithm with the inclusion of Lagrange interpolation to enhance the algorithm damage detection sensitivity for sparse and high density curvature mode shape displacement data. Finite element analysis (FEA) model with free-free boundary condition of an aluminum beam has been carried out to investigate the feasibility of the proposed method. Undamaged curvature mode shape data from the damaged structure was estimated using Gapped Smoothing Method (GSM) and Savitzky-Golay (SG) filters with two different grid points of 149 and 74. Structural Irregularity Index (SII) and Damage Estimate Reliability (DER) were used to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm. Numerical results show inclusion of Lagrange interpolation in mode shape curvature algorithm with Savitzky-Golay filter has better performance on estimate damage size by 2.81% of DER value for less dense (74 grid points) compared to GSM. The present method shows the inclusion of Lagrange interpolation has increased the sensitivity of mode shape curvature algorithm to identify damage size in beam-type structures compared to the previous method.

The use of carbon fibres reinforced plastic (CFRP) composites material for product structures has been steadily increasing due to the superior material properties such as high strength, low weight and corrosion resistance especially in aerospace industry. This work presents a research on the influence of various router or burrs tool geometrical feature towards surface roughness in edge trimming process on a specific CFRP material. CFRP panel which measured in 3.41mm thickness with 28 plies in total has been chosen to be the main study material. Three various geometrical features of router tool made of uncoated tungsten carbide material with diameter of 6.35mm which vary in number of flute and helix angle were utilized to investigate the effect of surface roughness in edge trimming of CFRP material. Surface roughness measurement was taken using Mitutoyo Surftest SJ-410. Furthermore, optical microscope Nikon MM-800 is utilized to further observe the trimmed surfaces. The result reveals that tool type 3 (T3) resulted the lowest surface roughness with respect to the overall averaged Ra value which ranged between 2.22µm to 5.29µm whilst tool type 1 (T1) obtained the highest Ra values ranged between 2.86µm to 19.36µm. On the other hand, the tool type 2 (T2) falls in the middle between the rests of two others type of tool which stated the range of Ra average value was between 3.91µm to 5.28µm. This result is also supported by photomicrographs observation taken by optical microscope which elaborated and discussed further in this paper.

In recent years, the development of nanotechnology has paved the way of using nanoparticles as foam stabilizer. The applications of silicon dioxide (SiO₂) nanoparticles in improving foam stability received great attention among researchers over the past decade, either synergistic SiO₂ nanoparticles-surfactant foam or nanoparticles-gas supercritical foam. In fact, the significant difference between nanoparticles and surfactant as foam stabilizer is the adsorption energy of nanoparticles at gas-liquid interfaces, which are hundred or thousand times bigger than surfactant adsorption energy. Besides, the effectiveness of nanoparticles as foam stabilizer also influenced by the maximum capillary pressure, particle arrangement during film drainage, and the presence of aggregate and cork formation inside lamellae. Variety parameters of nanoparticles-fluid-rock properties have been studied in order to optimize foam flooding efficiency-e.g., type of nanoparticles, particle concentration, particle size, surface modification, salinity, permeability, wettability etc. However, to date, no attempt has been made to comprehensively review these existing literatures. Thus, to fill this identified gap, the results of previous studies are discussed, challenged and direction for further studies are suggested in this paper.

River quality standard in Indonesia still determined normatively. It apply for all river with various conditions. This is not appropriate for water quality management because each river have different characteristics to keep the optimal condition for the life in water body. With dynamic system model of dissolved oxygen (DO), DO's changes can be approached. DO is the most important parameter to know the quality of water body. Furthermore, it could be used for estimate waste assimilating capacity (WAC) for organic waste to be discharged to water body for optimal DO's condition. This research is to make dynamic system model of DO's river using Stella v9.1.3 application. Object research located on Brantas River at Malang city. The behaviors of DO's kinetics for each monitoring point at Brantas river Malang city are approached with the dynamic system model of DO that had done verified and validated with the constrain: (1) reaeration rate of the river for typical rivers as much 1.5 / day; (2) SOD's deoxygenation rate is assumed as much 5 grO₂/m² for Brantas river with moderately pollution. From the result of sensitivity analysis of DO's dynamic system model can be determined range value for optimal DO for fish's life. The WAC for pollutant of BOD, NH₃ and NO₂ can be determined also. For rainy season in 2015, the WAC for the river pollutant of BOD have used almost all. Different condition of used WAC for NH₃ and NO₂. The remaining WAC for NH₃ and NO₂ are still near the available WAC.

Managers of tofu craftsmen complain a lot on the issue of soybean raw materials that the more days the price is increasing so high, so the benefits gained is decreasing significantly. To anticipate the continuous soybean price increase, the tofu craftsmen plan to make a squeezer machine of cooked soybean porridge which is useful to increase the juice, reduce the time of squeeze, and can ease the squeeze. The benefits of squeezer machine of cooked soybean porridge are that from the aspect of its output it will produce more, that in terms of time it can be faster, that the energy spent is very small because the squeeze utilizes the power of the driving motor, and the tofu dregs produced will be less. The performance study of hygienic tofu making by utilizing a squeezer machine of cooked soybean porridge will be done by comparing the measurement of squeeze time which is currently done by measuring the squeeze time by utilizing the squeezer machine of cooked soybean porridge and measuring the water content in the tofu dregs after the squeeze process. The results are by utilizing the squeezer machine of cooked soybean porridge meet the requirements in accordance with the wishes of the tofu craftsmen in which the water content in the tofu dregs is little, the tofu produced is more, and the process of squeeze is quicker.

Filament winding technique is a traditional composite fabrication process, which is generally used in filament winding machine with different axes motions. Current several filament winding machines have complicated and expensive control systems, which are used wire connection method to control. However, the main problem of filament winding machine system is that it is mostly controlled by the sophisticated systems using traditional connection method. The aim of this paper is to design a mobile software application to control the 3-axis filament winding machine with wireless connection using open-source platform. The 3-axis filament winding machine is briefly fabricated using aluminium profile for structure frame. The mobile application is designed to control several parameters such as winding angle, length and thickness. The mobile software is used to produce filament wound tubes, which is performed using Bluetooth. Bluetooth module is successfully applied to filament winding machine control system, which makes a significant contribution to winding machine control system methods.

Regional characters and city architecture research are prominent information required to observe the regional elements. Main objectives of the research are to maintain Malang city identity and to determine regions or buildings that can be preserved as local regulations in the sustainable development. The location that was taken as a case study was Malang in East Java Province. The data were collected in this study by using several methods; interviews and visual observations. The data which were obtained from such methods were classified based on the benefits and the depth of the meaning of the data. The data triangulation was also performed. The SWOT analysis was employed to describe the strategy in this study. The research findings region and architecture character can be used as a basic concept in the determination of sustainable development policies of Malang.

High heat flux generated by advance miniature electronic devices with high power density is one of the factor that often adversely affects the device performance. Microchannels heat sink appears as a promising method which can removes the such heat flux. However, pressure drop generated by geometry in innovated MCHS consumes high pumping power in order to obtain the optimum overall performance of the MCHS. In this study, the combined effect of secondary channel with hybrid design (SD-RR-SC MCHS) has been analysed numerically. The result shows SD-RR-SC MCHS obtained highest overall performance over other designs for the low Re number (100≤ Re ≤450) and achieved PF of 1.65 at Re = 450. Besides that, the increases of pumping power consumption corresponding to CR MCHS for SD-RR-SC MCHS, SD-RR MCHS and RR MCHS at Re number of 450 are 71.2%, 101.7% and 351.4%, respectively. Means that, SD-RR-SC MCHS is suitable for an application which requires lower pumping power consumption. The existence of secondary channel geometry in SD-RR-SC MCHS has reduced the static pressure in its channel that contributes to the reduction of pumping power consumption. Furthermore, the design shows the most uniform velocity distribution which has contributed to the thermal performance enhancement.

In this study, the investigation of engine combustion, performance and emissions of liquid liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) injection was carried out using a four-stroke 1.6 L spark-ignition (SI) engine. The experiments were performed at 3,000 rpm and at four throttle positions (TP): 25%, 50%, 75% and 100%, and the results were compared with reference fuel, unleaded petrol (ULP). Analysis of combustion showed that the LPG has higher in-cylinder pressure and rate of pressure rise (ROPR) as the TP increased with respect to the ULP. The results also indicated that the rate of heat release (ROHR) and mass fraction burn (MFB) of LPG had risen earlier than ULP as the TP increased. In view of combustion stability, LPG has better stability at all TPs with lower variance, that is in the range of 2.6% to 13.1% than that of the ULP. Torque and brake mean effective pressure (BMEP) results revealed that LPG has higher value as compared with ULP. The brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) of liquid LPG injection was found to be averagely lower than that of the ULP. Concurrently, the emissions of nitrogen oxides (NO_x), hydrocarbon (HC) and carbon monoxide (CO) of liquid LPG injection were recorded to be higher than that of the ULP.

A numerical investigation on melting of Phase Change Material (PCM) after dispersed with various types of nanoparticles is presented in this study. Nanoparticles with high thermal conductivity properties could be a good additive to enhance the thermal performance of PCM in latent heat thermal energy storage. This paper focus on the melting rate of paraffin wax as PCM dispersed with three types of nanoparticles: Alumina (Al₂O₃), Copper oxide (CuO) and Zinc Oxide (ZnO) in a 25mm × 25mm square enclosure. The effect of heating side of the wall and the concentration of nanoparticles dispersed in PCM were investigated. ANSYS Workbench 17.0 that included mesh generation tools and FLUENT software was used to run the simulation. Enthalpy porosity method was applied in this numerical study. Results shown that heat transfer rate was improved by adding low volume fraction of nanoparticles. Heating from the side wall of the enclose has better melting rate than heating from below.

This paper reports the results of various researches on the engine performance and emission characteristics of Diesel engine using nano particles additives in diesel, biodiesel and water emulsified fuels. There are two methods of reducing the exhaust gas emission of the Diesel engine. First method is to reduce the emissions by using exhaust gas treatment devices like catalytic converter and diesel particulate filter. However, use of these devices affects the performance of Diesel engine. Second method to reduce emissions and improve performance of CI engine is the use of fuel additive. Main pollutants of Diesel engine are oxide of nitrogen (NOx) and particulate matter (PM). However, it is difficult to control NOx and PM simultaneously. Many researchers report that the best method to control the emissions and improve the engine performance is the use of nano particles additives and water emulsified fuels. This research paper also reports the biodiesel fuel as an alternative to diesel fuel by using various nano particle additives. Comparative studies of effects on various properties of diesel and biodiesel fuels without/with water contents and nano particles additives by previous researchers are done. Most of the researchers reported improved engine performance and reduction in emission characteristics with dosing of nano particles additives in diesel and biodiesel.

In this paper, an overview about experimental procedure of phase change material (PCM), in order to enhance its thermal properties is discussed. Enhancement of PCM needs the employment of nanoparticle that would affect the thermo-physical properties. The supercooling degree of PCM influenced by dispersion of nanoparticle which can be controlled by the nucleation process of nanoparticle. Hence, the best candidate material as nucleating agent is preferred in order to maximize the dispersion nanoparticle in PCM. In addition, the tiny structure will cause nanoparticle to have a large surface area that correlates with their physical and chemical properties that react to the thermal-physical properties of PCM. In this review, graphene-based nanoparticle is discussed. The surface area of graphene is the main characteristics used in determining the best thermal physical properties for nano-enhanced phase change material (NEPCM). Due to the best characteristics as base phase change material, inorganic salt hydrates material is reviewed in this paper. However, there have been limited research carried out about the employment of graphene nanoparticles synthesis, characterization and modification process of nanoparticle itself to enhance the thermal physical properties of inorganic PCM.

Nickel Aluminium Bronze (NAB) is an excellent engineering material for maritime application due to its selective mechanical properties and relatively excellent corrosion resistant. However, NAB is susceptible to porosities due to dissolved gasses absorbed during its casting processes and adversely affects the mechanical properties. So, a degassing agent is added to the melt of NAB before the pouring process to reduce the dissolved gasses. A few parameters were initiated to investigate the effect of the degassing agent. Firstly, the effect of the degassing agent on the solidification behavior of the NAB alloy is studied using thermal analysis. Cooling curves can provide information on liquidus, eutectic, undercooling, recalescence and solidus temperature of the NAB alloy. Secondly, Differential thermal analysis (DTA) technique is employed to determine this thermal arrest temperature of NAB alloy from the cooling curves. The increasing in degassing agent addition will increase the average cooling rate of the NAB during solidification process but also slightly increasing the recalescence effect at the same time. It is discovered the higher cooling rate will reduce the dendritic growth and lead to better mechanical properties. Higher degassing addition also produced a smaller dendritic structure which promotes the higher mechanical strength. It has been proven through the tensile test, hardness test and microstructure analysis using FESEM. The relationship between, DAS average length, SDAS average length, tensile stress and hardness have been studied.

Waibakul City, Central Sumba Regency, East Nusa Tenggara Province, Indonesia is affected by floods every year that comes from overflow of drainage channels. The area of Waibakul is 76, 44 km^2 and dominated by agricultural land. The drainage system is incorporated into the irrigation system, thus forming a complex network of channels. The topography of the area is very flat, with slope (0 to 3) % reaching 78.56% and forming natural basins that are used as rainwater catchment reservoirs. The results of evaluation show that the majority of channel capacity is not roportional to the burden that must be discharged. The reservoir performance is not maximal because the water discharge system only relies on natural water absorption into the soil, so if there is a successive rain then the reservoir is full thus the reservoir control capacity becomes very small. The recommendation for flood control strategies are: (1). Divide the catchment area into sub-catchment areas based on the drainage service area, so the problems can be more easily solved and completed gradually. (2). Increase the capacity of multiple channels. (3). infiltration wells as a means of reservoir water drainage.(4). Control the burden of flood discharge to the office area by making a shotcut. (5). Control the flood water level in rivers that is crossing central office area by making long storage with spillway.

In automobile cooling system, water and ethylene glycol are usually used as coolant. For many years, nanofluid has been reported to enhance thermal properties of conventional heat transfer fluid due to dispersion of solid particles which exhibit superior thermal conductivity. Many past researchers found improvement of heat transfer rate in automobile cooling system by using nanofluid as coolant. However, there are very few reported on drawback such as tribological impact on components in automobile cooling system. Hence, this paper focused to determine erosion-corrosion effect of nanofluid on aluminium impeller in Perodua Kancil D37 water pump. Working parameters such as inlet pressure, coolant temperature and rpm of pump were in line with ASTM D2809-09 standard. Testing coolants were made up of corrosive water, ethylene glycol and graphene nanoplatelets. Each pump surface profile was inspected using 3D imaging microscope after undergoing 100 hours of testing continuously. Also, precise weight measurement was carried out before and after testing to determine total material loss. It was observed that corrosion effect was about the same for both base coolant and nanocoolant. Erosion-corrosion effect increased material loss when nanocoolant was used instead of base coolant. Based on ASTM 2809-09 standard, erosion-corrosion damage on impeller was found to be minimal and scored high rating in evaluation. Thus, both coolants can be considered to be incorporated in future cooling system.

Vortex tube has been using widely in industry for the cooling process. It is working as a refrigerator which split compressed gas into the hot and cold stream without using any electrical or chemical process. In term of application, the effect of geometrical parameters on the cold flow temperature of vortex tube by using high temperature compressed gas is obscure, and effect of certain working gas has yet to be vigorously researched. Thus, the objective of this analysis is to determine the effect of length of the vortex tube, cold exit diameter and different high temperature working gas. There are 3 different tube length, 3 different cold diameter, and 7 different types of gas are used. The models are designed from SolidWork with several parameters. Simflow, which is free software, is selected to analyse the effect on model numerically. From the results, it is clear that the optimum tube length, cold exit diameter, and working gas are L = 175 mm, d = 4 mm and helium, respectively.

This paper aimed to evaluate the state of three different flow parameters of nanofluids and hybrid nanofluids flowing through inside header and riser tube of flat plate solar collector. This research work studied with Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modelling method using nanofluids (Al₂O₃, TiO₂, ZnO) and hybrid nanofluids (Al₂O₃+TiO₂, TiO₂+ZnO, ZnO + Al₂O₃). The modelling was three dimensional under k-epsilon turbulence model, which was set with Standard and Standard Wall Functions. Besides, Absolute reference frame and calculative intensity percentage was fixed. The base fluid was water as well as volume fraction of nanofluids and hybrid nanofluids was 0.1%. Single-phase viscous model with energy equation used. Three types of design models (Model A, B and C) used with fixed inlet and outlet diameter. The number of header tubes fixed with two, but the number of riser tube varied such as two, seven and twelve. Maximum dynamic pressure increased in model B for both nanofluid and hybrid nanofluid of about 48% and 16% respectively. Velocity magnitude enhanced in maximal for both nanofluid and hybrid nanofluid in model B. Besides, highest turbulence kinetic energy achieved in model A (5.5%) for nanofluids and in model B (18%) for hybrid nanofluids. Model B perform better comparing with model A and model C.

Automotive Air conditioning (AAC) is a unit that uses a high measure of energy from a car total engine power. In equatorial climate country such as Malaysia, high usage of AAC is inevitable due to hot, humid and rainy weather throughout the year. An understanding about the energy and exergy losses is essential to find the potential improvement to maximise the efficiency in an AAC system. The main objective of this study is to study the performance of energy and the exergy of a compact automotive air conditioning system. This cycle uses R134a and PAG lubricant as the working fluid. The different ranges of initial refrigerant charge and compressor speed have been tested on the AAC to evaluate the effect of different major thermodynamic parameters in performance. A theoretical model is developed to work out the thermodynamic parameters such as coefficient of performance, exergy destruction ratio, component efficiency defect as well as the dimensionless exergy balance for the AAC system components. The results of this study have shown that most of the energy has been destructed in evaporator part. In order to maximize the efficiency and performance of AAC system, further optimization needs to be done in order to improve the evaporator component.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of diesel-biodiesel-hexanol tri-fuel blends on combustion and exhaust emissions characteristics of a diesel engine. The presence of a hexanol (C₆H₁₃OH) in tri-fuel blends helps to increase the oxygen content in combustion phase. The experimental tests were performed with YANMAR TF120M single-cylinder, direct-injection diesel engine. The results of tri-fuel blends were investigated and compared with diesel fuel (DF) and neat biodiesel (B100). The engine was run at varying engine loads 0%, 25%, 50%, 75%, and 100% at constant engine speed 1800 rpm. DF and palm oil methyl-ester (POME) were dispersed in 5%, 10%, and 15% hexanol, which were formed as tri-fuel blends. The blending process of tri-fuel blends used ultrasonic emulsifier with cycle 0.5 and an amplitude of 70%, within 2 minutes. Compared to DF, the results reveal the in-cylinder pressure of B100, HE5, HE10, and HE15, were reduced by 2.23%, 1.95%, 2.19%, and 2.00%, respectively at 50% engine load. Furthermore, the heat release rate at 50% engine load for HE15 was increased by 6.42%, gives the highest combustion efficiency. CO, CO₂ and NO_x emissions were decreased by 7.06%, 12.20%, and 22.85% for HE15 at 75% engine load. This study concluded that HE15 fuel blend shows positive impacts in combustion and emissions characteristics of a diesel engine.

Various studies by leading experts have shown the effectiveness of nanolubricant in improving the performance of the automotive air conditioning (AAC) system. Along with the advancement of technology, composite nanolubricant have been introduced and have been proven to have better properties than normal nanolubricant. The Al₂O₃-SiO₂/PAG composite nanolubricant have better stability, better heat transfer, and improve tribology characteristic compare to its individual single nanoparticles nanolubricant. However, until now no experiments were conducted to test the effectiveness of composite nanolubricant in the AAC system. An experimental study is then taken by testing the Al₂O₃-SiO₂/PAG in AAC system. The results of this experiment have been compared with results of the previous study that uses Al₂O₃/PAG and SiO₂/PAG in AAC system. It is found that the composite nanolubricant have a high enhancement in the COP and does reduce the compressor work of the AAC system. The comparison between Al₂O₃-SiO₂/PAG, Al₂O₃/PAG and SiO₂/PAG nanolubricant demonstrates that Al₂O₃-SiO₂/PAG, has better performance in term of compressor work reduction and COP enhancement at an average of 28.7 % and 31.64 %, respectively. At last, it was recommended to use the Al₂O₃-SiO₂/PAG nanolubricant for application in AAC system.

The rapid depletion of fossil fuels coupled with the awareness of environmental issues and escalation of petroleum prices have led to intensive efforts in the search for renewable and environmentally friendly alternative fuel. Biodiesel is one such fuel. The main objective of this study is to evaluate the performance and emissions characteristics of a single-cylinder diesel engine fuelled with egusi biodiesel and compared against the conventional diesel and palm oil based biodiesel available in the Malaysian market. The oil extraction from whole Egusi seeds is obtained through Soxhlet extractor and went through transesterification process. The egusi based biodiesel is prepared for B7 (7% egusi biodiesel, 93% diesel) so that a direct comparison can be made against the palm oil based biodiesel sold in the market (grade B7). A single-cylinder, four-stroke diesel engine with speed of 1200-2000 rpm is used to evaluate the engine performance. Egusi based biodiesel shows a comparable engine performance to that of conventional diesel and B7 palm oil. B7 Egusi oil reduces carbon dioxide (CO2) and carbon monoxide (CO) by 0.8-0.9 %, while unburnt hydrocarbon (UHC) and nitrogen oxides (NOx) by 75-80 % from that of diesel. It shows that the Egusi based biodiesel holds the potential as a biodiesel feedstock in the future.

Miniaturization as a size reduction of electronic devices components lead to high performance, but with increase in heat flux density which reduce the efficiency of these devices. Minichannel has been considered to improve the heat dissipation with minimal pressure drop through regulation of the channel configurations. In this study, a divergent-convergent minichannel heat sink (DCMCHS) was investigated numerically using Finite volume method to model single-phase forced convection for nanofluid cooling as a passive means to enhance the heat transfer performance for Reynolds number range of 2000 to 2300 and using Aqueous Alumina as nanofluid with concentrations of 0.1 – 0.8%. The effect of Reynolds number, the convection coefficient and pressure drop in relation to the heat flux were investigated and discussed. The results show that, Nusselt number increases with increase in volume fraction and Reynolds number, whereas friction factor decreased with increasing Reynolds number. Heat removal by the nanofluid is higher near the walls than in the central part of the minichannel, and the performance factor is between 1.00 – 1.01 and it increases with increase in concentration and flow velocity. Thus, combine passive techniques of DCMCHS and nanofluid provides better enhancement of heat transfer and hydraulic attributes of the minichannel heat sink for cooling purposes.

Stirling engine is an external combustion engine, which generates power from any kind of heat source. Stirling engine offers lower emissions level compared to the internal combustion engines. The driving mechanisms differ based on the engine configurations. For beta-configuration Stirling engine, rhombic-drive mechanism indicates most suitable driving mechanism due to the concentric cylinder's arrangement. The determination of rhombic-drives primary geometrical parameters and consideration from various aspects are needed to achieve high power production, efficiency and ensure successful engine operation. In this paper, the kinematic investigations of rhombic-drives primary geometrical parameters are carried out to investigate the effects of phase angle, displacement and eccentricity ratio based on pre-determination of different crank offset radius, eccentricity ratio and connecting rod length. It is found that the adjustment of crank offset radius cause significant effect to the eccentricity ratio and engines displacement. Meanwhile, the adjustment of connecting rod length induced significant changes in phase angle since there are changes in TDC and BDC for both pistons.

A single-cylinder rhombic drive beta-configuration Stirling engine, heated and cooled at designated temperature, and fuelled with a fixed amount of Helium gas is used to predict and analyse the thermodynamic cycle performance. A general zero-dimensional numerical model is adapted throughout the prediction of Stirling engine performance. The numerical model is determined based on overall geometrical parameters, working fluid properties, swept and un-swept volume. Schmidt and ideal adiabatic analysis based on methodology presented by Berchowitz and Urieli are carried out to predict the cycle pressure, volumetric displacement, work and energy produced during the expansion and compression processes in the cylinder. Based on the designated working condition, the engine is predicted to generate 500 W of power at engine speed of 300 rpm. The indicated thermal efficiency is found to be 66% based on 90° phase angle setting, 4.5 bar of Helium cylinder mean pressure, 893 K of expansion space temperature and 303 K of cooler space temperature.

Kemuning River flood every year and inundate the city of Sampang. Flood discharge is dominated by surface runoff. The Sungai Kemuning River Basin (DAS) is mostly (77%) in the form of gardens, fields and rice fields. The control of surface runoff is done by land conservation method, with the combination of 3 methods, namely: Vegetative, Mechanical, and Constructive Method.Conservation of vegetative methods, it is advisable to plant Mango or water apple with a combination of elephant grass (Pennisetum purpureum cv. Mott) in the garden, polowijo and elephant grass in the fields, and Paddy and Polowijo (one of: corn, soybeans, beans) in the fields. Mango and water apple is a local plant, but it is recommended to be updated with more superior varieties to be more productive. Elephant Grass is a new variety that is suitable to be planted in the watershed area, and it is intended to increase the stock of livestock feed, both cattle and goats. Conservation of mechanical methods, in the form of: making of infiltration holes and bench terraces in the garden, improving the design of embankments in fields and fields. The height of the embankment is reminded from 30 cm to 40 cm so as to increase the depth of the puddle in the fields from 0 cm to 30 cm, and the paddy field from 15 cm to 30 cm. With a land area of 20,526,430,000 m2 and a rice field of 1,183,356,100,000 m2, an increase in rainwater storage capacity of 793,296 m3 is obtained. This is identical with the capacity of two large dams. Conservation of constructive methods in the form of wells in the fields and rice fields. Recess wells are made in fields and rice fields with the amount and distribution of 1 unit per 2500 m2. The well serves as a recharge well to accelerate the decrease in the height of the normal puddle in the fields and in the rice fields. The peak flood discharge rates on the seven Sub-watersheds after conservation of land, respectively from Sub-DAS 1 to 7 are: 55%; 51%; 50%; 20%; 67%; 58%; 56%.

Diabetes mellitus referred to inability to produce or respond to hormone insulin resulted in elevated blood glucose level in human body. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between fasting blood glucose, cholesterol and blood pressure levels in healthy subjects. 211 subjects having age between 23-66 years old were randomly selected among UMP's residents from April 2017 to May 2018. Mann-Whitney Ranksum test determine the significant differences between overall and diabetics subjects. Pearson Correlation compute the associations between fasting blood glucose, lipid profile substances and blood pressure. Linear regression analysis verified the relationship between fasting blood glucose and other parameters, with 95%CI. Fasting blood glucose are significantly difference (p<0.05) with blood pressure and others lipid profile substances except for total cholesterol. All lipid profile substances are significantly difference (p<0.05) with blood pressure level. There is 59%(R²-value) chances in getting correct prediction of diabetes using high density lipo-protein cholesterol, low density lipo-protein cholesterol, triglyceride, systolic blood pressure and triglyceride based on fasting blood glucose value. However, a larger and well-spread cohort with different backgrounds and demographics however is required to validate the finding of this study.

In the present study, an investigation of double lap joints using two different joining methods was carried out. Carbon fiber and glass fiber reinforced materials were the composite materials that joined with the conventional steel and aluminium. Adhesive bonding joint and a combination of adhesive and mechanical fastener joints were used as a joining approach. It is found that adhesive bonding joint provided a better performance compared to the hybrid joint, where the holes created in the specimens for inserting mechanical fasteners caused a lower strength. It is observed that the adhesive joining of the glass fiber and steel obtained a maximum load of 35.5 KN, which is the highest strength among all other combinations examined in this study, while the similar combination joined using adhesive bonding and mechanical fastener showed a maximum load less than the adhesive joining by 21.4 %.

Antioxidants play an important role in inhibiting and scavenging free radicals, thus providing protection to human against infections and degenerative diseases. Current research is now directed towards natural antioxidants originated from plants due to safe therapeutics. Cassia alata plant has been commonly used as medicinal herbs for treating fungal infection such as ringworm and eczema. Nevertheless, there are only few studies focused on C. alata. This work aims to provide information about the antioxidant capacity of C. alata leaves at different stages of maturity and drying temperatures. The leaf maturity (young, medium and old) were determined by using chlorophyll meter. The leaves were dried at different temperatures (30, 40, 60 and 80 °C) using a laboratory oven. The leaves were then analysed for its antioxidant capacity. The extract of C. alata exhibited strong scavenging effect on 2, 2-diphenyl-2-picryl hydrazyl (DPPH) free radical.The antioxidant capacity in the examined extracts ranged from 85.81 to 89.71%. The results exhibited that the antioxidant capacity of C. alata extracts increased when the maturity of the leaves increased. Besides that, drying temperature was also found to increase the antioxidant capacity of C. alata leaves.

The objective of this research is to investigate the relationship between drying temperature and age of leaves on the total phenolic content of Ficus deltoidea leaves. The leaves were dried at 4 different temperatures which are 30, 40, 60 and 80 °C. The age of leaves is determined by using chlorophyll meter to measure the chlorophyll content and categorized into three level of age leaves. The total phenolic content of the F. deltoidea dried leaves were determined using Standard Folin–Ciocalteu (FC) analytical methodology with methanolic extracts of the samples. The result showed that the total phenolic content is highest at 40°C drying temperature and at medium-aged of leaves. It is suggested to consider drying the F. deltoidea leaves at 40-80°C and harvest at the medium-aged of leaves maturity to obtain high total phenolic content.

In this study, the effect of die angle on the microstructure and mechanical properties of industrial aluminium alloy AA6061 produced by severe plastic deformation (SPD) through equal channel angular pressing (ECAP) is examined. The objectives of the present investigation are to evaluate the effect of ECAP die angle on the microstructure and mechanical properties of ECAP-ed AA6061. Heat treated AA6061 were divided to three conditions which is non-ECAP, ECAP-ed by 126º channel angle and ECAP-ed by 120º channel angle. The hardness evaluation and microstructural analysis were done on the samples after ECAP. The grain size of all materials was compared by applying the technique of grain size analysis while the hardness of the materials was compared by performing Vickers hardness calculation. From the hardness test, it found that 120º channel angle gives out an increment of hardness by 43.64% while for 126º channel angle the increment hardness is 40.14% compared to non-ECAP AA6061. Microstructural analysis reveals both ECAP-ed samples have elongated and refined grain size with smaller precipitate particulate compared to non-ECAP sample however no significant difference between the angles were observed. High strain induced during ECAP process increase dislocation in AA6061 and breaking the precipitate thus causing high hardness due to grain refinement. Varying the ECAP die angle may lower the pressure used during pressing without compromising the benefit of ECAP process in producing materials with improved mechanical properties.

Pulmonary Tuberculosis is a infectious disease caused by Mycobacterium Tuberculosis and actually can be found aon a lung but may affect the other organs. The case of pulmonary TB with BTA + at Puskesmas Simpang Tiga in Pidie district is about 60 case at the year of 2014 and incrase to 84 case at 2015. This research is to investigatethe correlation of social support with pulmonary tuberculosis medication adherence with DOTS strategic at Puskesmas Simpang Tiga in Pidie District. This research is based on descriptive analytic with cross sectional design. Tis research sample is made by 80 total sampling. The statistical test used is the Logistic Regression test by using Stat 13. Results showed that 63.75% of respondents who obediently take medicine, 57.50% of respondents with poor emotional support, 57.50% of respondents with good informational support, 52.50% of respondents with good instrumental support, and 51.25 % of respondents with less rewards good support. The results of the bivariate analysis obtained emotional support (OR = 2.1, P value = 0.121), informational support (OR = 3.5, p value = 0.009), instrumental support (OR = 1.6, p value = 0.302), and support award (OR = 0.6, p value = 0.387). The results of the research conclude that the dominant informational support variable affect medication adherence with DOTS strategy on pulmonary TB patientswith the value (OR = 3.5, P value = 0.009).

Rapid growth of plastics industries in Asia's emerging markets particularly in Malaysia, in one way, it raised expectations for everyday comforts, in the other way it also causes environmental issues. Plastic bottle for recycling can be found from the household waste stream, and most of them are made from Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET). Recycling this plastic into another form might be one of the cheapest and rapid solutions. However, turning this plastic into some other usable form uses energy and this may not become a green waste management solution. In this research, PET is utilized to explore its potential prospects to upgrade asphalt mixture properties. This study investigates the use of waste plastic as modifier for aggregates (plastic coating aggregate). The type of plastic used in this study was waste PET plastic bottle. The shredded waste PET plastic (size 0.075mm to 1.18mm) was mixed with hot aggregate to form a thin layer on the surface of the aggregates. The properties of modified aggregate and unmodified aggregate was tested and compared. 1% and 2% of plastic by weight of aggregate were used to coat the aggregate. The plastic-coated aggregates are tested for impact value and crushing value. The test results had demonstrated that there was an improvement in the properties of plastic coated aggregates.

In this paper fault detection of brushed DC motor is described. Recently, Thermal Signature Analysis (TSA) has become a common tool for fault analysis of AC induction motors. Currently, very little research has been performed using thermal signature analysis on brushed DC motors. This paper is a present fault detection of DC motors using thermal signature analysis. In order to organize the detection, the thermal behaviour of DC motor was analysed using the K-type thermocouple with data logger. The thermocouples were mounted on 4 part of the DC motor, casing, permanent magnet, brush and bearing. The initial measurements of thermal behaviour were realized by using healthy DC motor as a sample of a thermal behaviour. Furthermore, the measurements of thermal behaviour for the same type of motor with thick carbon impurities on commutator has been implemented to compare with the thermal behaviour of healthy DC motor. The significant observation on steady state temperature of thermal behaviour between healthy DC motors and faulty DC motor will be analysed. From the analysis of thermal behaviour between healthy DC motor and commutator fault DC motor, that can clearly recognize the commutator fault by through the different of characteristic temperature profile of DC motor.

This study motivated by lack of design process in developing an industrial product. It introduces a method of developing lumbar support design goals and strategies that associated with industrial workers. The main point in the development of a product is required of customer needs towards the design and functionality. As we noticed, lumbar support is one of the cases of mediation strategy that been used in a way to reduce the back pain issues in the company. However, the criteria of current lumbar support do not achieve the requirement of users and a good quality was too expensive. The survey was distributed to analyse respondents knowledge and future criteria on new lumbar support based on their experiences. This method also investigates the feedback and experiences of current lumbar support design. Therefore, this factor suggested improving the framework of new lumbar support design based on factors of ergonomic design, human experiences, and psychophysical factors. This paper created to discuss the flow of redesigning the lumbar support by using a design and development research methods, strategies and issues. Besides, the effectiveness of this system needed to be focused and improved in this research. The recommended framework allowed the better path in the design process, management information system design and product development.

Research on direct absorption solar collector (DASC) has been quite intensive in the past decade. Solar thermal collector plays a vital role to determine the performance of DASC by utilized the heat transfer fluid to harvest the energy while the use of nanofluid (nanoparticle dispersion in a base fluid) enhanced the thermal conductivity. A lot of researchers have studied the influence of several parameters such as collector geometry and nanoparticle materials on the solar thermal collector efficiency for the past decade. This paper presents a recent progress on numerical modelling of nanofluid direct absorption solar collector (NDASC) for different type of geometry including flat type, parabolic trough and cylindrical tube. In this review, a more comprehensive numerical methods and solar collector geometry on NDASC are summarized. Finally, some recommendations are presented for future research guidance.

The sandwich structure is known by inner and outer faces which acted compositely with relatively low strength core. Sandwich panel consisted of two thin and stiff skins and separated by a thick and lightweight core. The objective of this study to predict the behaviour of the laser-welded sandwich panel under three-point bending test. Numerical modelling of laser-welded was studied and run under bending loading. The sandwich panels were studied on a different number of the unit cell; 1-core, 2-core and 3-core. The role of a number of web-core to determine overall deformation and local failure response of the sandwich panel was studied. Faceplate and web plate were connected by using diode laser welding. The plates were cut by using sheet metal cutter machine for precise dimension. The sandwich panel modelled by using Abaqus 6.13 version to predict the response of the sandwich panel under bending loading. Cell wall buckling was found as an initial failure in the corrugated core system. The prediction result showed good agreement with experimental measurements.

The length of road network in Indonesia continues to increase gradually in every year. This increase will influence an availability of natural resources as the formation materials of road structures. For that, it is necessary to develop a green road concept that is able to reduce the use of natural resources and minimize the occurrence of waste materials generated. This concept is an ongoing movement that targets the construction of the planning, implementation, and usage of environmentally friendly construction products, efficient in energy and resource usage, and low cost and the achievement of appropriate construction quality. Increased waste materials in the construction process is one aspect that must be minimized in order to achieve the concept of green roads. This study aims to analyze the relationship and influence the factors of application of green roads concept to waste management of road construction project. Another purpose is to know the dominant factors affecting waste management of road construction projects. This study was done for road construction process in the Banda Aceh in Indonesia. This research uses qualitative and quantitative methods through the distribution of questionnaires. Respondents in this study were 90 units of road contractor companies has implemented projects from 2010 to 2016. The research result shows that the factor of application of green road concept that has the most influence on waste management is economic factor. The effect of this economic factor on road waste management is 18.7%. This indicates that if economic factor is enhanced, the waste management will increase on road construction project in Banda Aceh City.

Nowadays, the issues of air pollution and global warming have become serious as the atmosphere contaminated with harmful gases from human daily life use of vehicles and industrial manufacturing process, leading to global warming and greenhouse effect. These had emphasised the need for better engines with higher performance and less emission level towards non-harmful and friendly environmental vehicle axillary. There are various techniques and methods used for such purposes. For instance, the nano gas dissolve technique can be used for fuel enhancement through a better combustion reaction by adding more oxidant gases molecular into combustion reaction. Dissolved gases can improve engine combustion performance for reducing the levels of harmful gas emission. The property of small nano particles helps to join or mix or transport interfacial within large molecules of fuels to mix up together and form new combination, introducing different chemical properties. Thus, this paper introduces a pre-design concept for fuel enhancement technique by dissolving nano gases such as air or oxygen into the gasoline fuel, taking advantage of hammer shock phenomena in fluid flow. It presents a case study for understanding combustion influence through use of gas dissolve technique with theoretical calculation validating the condition. The validating results obtained from the theoretical calculation and chemical theoretical results reactions theoretically expressed significant development in combustion mixture. Such technology can provide better fuel improvement for future recommended work by direct integration of the nano bubble generator hardware mobile size device on the fuel supply line.

It is important to study the vehicle efficiency in order to have better performance and lower emissions. The sub-compact vehicle is powered by an internal combustion engine (ICE). Usually, the incomplete combustion in ICE gives out by-products of such carbon dioxide (CO₂), nitrogen oxides (NOx), unburned hydrocarbon (UHC), and water (H₂O).The electricity seems can solve the global warming issues contribute by the emission produce from the IC engine by reducing the dependence on the operating system from it. Electric vehicle via an electric motor (EM) give high efficiency compared to internal combustion engine but lower at average top speed. This paper will discuss more on developing the hybrid electric vehicle system, especially for the small gasoline engine. The process involves in the development of the small hybrid system is similar to other larger hybrid vehicle system. However, the system is more compact in size and no external gearing system or gearbox system. When developing this type of hybrid system, the drivetrain structure and the hybrid operating control system configuration is the main attention to be studied. Before developing the hybrid system, it is important to understand the basic component contains in a hybrid system, type of a hybrid electric vehicle, the hybrid drivetrain structure and the hybrid operating control system configuration first. By implement the hybrid system in vehicle system today, it will contribute to the environmental effect by decrease the emission release to the air. This paper will focus more on the type of the drivetrain design and the operating control system that suitable to implement on the small hybrid vehicle. Small gasoline engine in this paper refers to the single cylinderinternal combustion engine with capacity below 150cc.

Studies on natural fibers reinforced composite has been growing rapidly due to abundant and availability of wide variety of natural fibers. One of the most promising and readily available natural fiber is oil palm empty fruits bunch (EFB), a side product of palm oil industries. This fiber could be converted into useful materials by combining them with other polymer, such as polyester resin, to produce biodegradable composite. Based on other research about empty fruit bunch (EFB), there is no research about empty fruit bunch reinforced polyester resin. Thus this research was conducted to investigate the performance of Polyester-EFB composite as well as their biodegradability. The composite was prepared by mixing certain amount of EFB (of 2-4 mm length) to polyester resin and hardened with methyl ethyl ketone peroxide (MEKP). The resulted composite were characterized for their mechanical properties, water absorptivity and weight reduction over time. Polyester-EFB 50 have the highest value of tensile strength which is about 22.31 N/mm2. This result of Polyester-EFB 50 shows that the tensile properties of composites are markedly improved by adding fibers to a polymer matrix since fibers have much higher strength and stiffness values than those of the matrices.

The present analysis deals with experimental investigation on the vibration behaviour of fiber metal laminates (FMLs) plate. FMLs offer good mechanical properties such as high specific properties in term of strength to weight and stiffness to weight ratio. However, it is observed that very few studies are available on the dynamic behaviour of FMLs. In this experiment, the dynamical behaviour of glass fiber/epoxy and fiber metal laminates was carried out. The specimens have been manufactured using different manufacturing process which is compression mould and vacuum bagging. Free vibration analysis by exciting an impact hammer at the cantilever plate were conducted to determine the dynamical characteristic of the specimens. The stiffness of the material increases, which contributes to the natural frequency increase.

Empowering employees' spiritual intelligence (SQ) is about bringing back the soul of the hospitality business. This study intends to identify factors that affect a food handler's' SQ and also to discover SQ's potential role in mediating food-hygiene practices and foodservice performance. Using judgemental sampling, this study conducted a cross-sectional study to analyse usable data of 1026. The results show that demographic factors significantly affect SQ level. Food-hygiene practices and food service performance were fully mediated by SQ, thus supporting the food handlers' thoughts of self-development and success at work. It is proposed that the positive outcomes from the large and varied datasets of the model can be generalised to the routine practices and performance of other institutions.

Knee Arthroplasty is a surgical procedure where the patient's knee is replace by prosthesis. By using the finite element analysis method, we can properly estimate the life span of the prosthesis and also the polymer mobile bearing between the prosthesis itself. Most of the prosthesis have a long lifespan but not for the polymer mobile bearing. Having only average of 2.5 years lifespan, it is a hustle for the patient to come back every 2.5 years to replace a new polymer especially for the elderlies. This research is made to investigate and predict the fatigue life of the polymer mobile bearing via finite element method and thus to design a newly improved prosthesis model based on the commercially available. In this research, three different designs were made based on the currently available mobile-bearing design. Each of the design will undergoes different value of forces depending on three different of gait cycles which are walking, ascending from the stairs as well as rising from squatting. Based on the fatigue life prediction using finite element method, the proposed design (design 2) obtained the highest lifespan ranging from 1.0 × 10^6 to 1.2 × 10^6cycle and it is increase almost 50% of the commercially available design life cycle (8 × 10^5 cycle). Thus, it is can be concluded that the finite element method can be used to predict life cycle of the mobile bearing successfully and can be used as a guided to propose an improved design of the prosthesis.

Nanofluid is a suspension of liquid containing metal or non-metallic nanoparticles of typical size (1-100 nm) dispersed into the base liquid. Hybrid or composite nanofluids is considered an extension of research work for single nanofluids, which can be carried out through a combination of two or more different nanoparticles - either in mixed or dispersed composites in liquids. The objective of this study is to investigate the stability of tri-hybrid nanofluids suspended in Water-Ethylene Glycol (EG) mixture. The tri-hybrid nanofluids were prepared at a volume concentration of 0.05 to 0.3% using the two-step method. Three types of nanoparticles used namely Al₂O₃, TiO₂ and SiO₂, and dispersed in a base fluid of water/EG. The investigation on the stability of the hybrid nanofluids in the present study is conducted through UV-Vis, zeta-potential, sedimentation and micrograph observation. The findings from the investigations on the visual stability of sedimentation show that the differences in concentration (0.05, 0.1, 0.2, 0.3%) have been low in day 14. It was found that 10 h sonication time is the most suitable period for sonication to obtain a stable suspension. Comparison of data concentration ratio to sedimentation for single, hybrid and tri-hybrid nanofluids presents tri-hybrid nanofluids remains stable with a concentration ratio of 80%. Zeta potential evaluation conducted for the tri-hybrid nanofluids obtained the value of 25.1 mV in the classification of good stability. It can be concluded that the tri-hybrid nanofluids were successfully prepared and achieved good stability.

In this study, Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) modelling of internal energy with different nanofluids (TiO₂ and crystal nano cellulose) studied. The modelling was three dimensional under Viscous Laminar model. The base fluid for nanoparticles was 60% water+40% ethylene glycol along with individual water and ethylene glycol fluids. Volume fraction of nanofluids was 0.5% and single-phase model used. The diameter of inlet and outlet was fixed of individual model and three kinds of designing model used here. The diameter of both header and riser tubes varied whereas the number of tubes varied only for riser. The results revealed that diameter and number of tubes (riser) do not affect on the internal energy. Since internal energy only depends on different properties of the inside fluids.

In this century, global on-road passenger vehicles raised rapidly with concerns regarding of air pollutions, greenhouse, climate change, economical and human life safety. However, what are the new vehicles emission standards implementation regulation involved? How can new emission regulation impact vehicle performance and environment pollution reductions? What is (Worldwide Harmonized Light Vehicle Test Procedure - WLTP)? How can (WLTP) regulation promote improvement to vehicle quality in reduction of emission to lower level possible and add more performance to the vehicles for open market? What is the real-world on-road (Real world Drive Emission- RDE) test new emission regulation and its demand? Why vehicle manufactures should present both emission level of laboratorial engine emission level and vehicle (RDE) emission level in EU? Presenting an accurate vehicle pollutant determination due to new EU regulation procedure of (WLTP) will help the consumer identifying the regulation cost fee and tax in registration the vehicle. Methodology based on comparative EU regulation assessment and (WLTP) regulation vehicle emission control technologies assessment. The paper focus on viewing, the potential of pollution regulation (WLTP) for vehicle emissions reductions. Provide an outline of the status of the EU vehicle pollution emission regulations information and identify priorities options and recommendations to the introduction of the (WLTP). Offering information gridline data for researchers in future study for the strict pollution regulation adopted by European countries and its impact on future academic study of vehicle emission experimental process in non-applicable countries, contribute the procedure process of (RDE) emission implementation test within (WLTP) to be familiar by researchers for future intended joining the regulation.

Crude oil is one of the basic needs required for humans to ease their life. The quality of crude oil with the lowest wax content is very important, in order to sustain the transportation and production of crude oil from offshore to onshore. Based on literature from previous studies, the appearance of wax depends on the temperature which is called Wax Appearance Temperature (WAT). Hence, there is a need to propose a new method to classify the waxy crude oil at a different temperature. The main purpose of this paper is to classify Malaysian waxy crude oil odor profile at different temperatures using intelligent classification technique. There are 28,000 data measurement of the waxy crude oil that was taken using an electronic nose (E-nose). The data readings have been normalized and analyzed using a statistical method. Then, the odor profiles were classified using K-Nearest Neighbour. The classification performance shows that the technique was able to classify the Malaysian waxy crude oil odor profile at different temperatures with 100% accuracy.

Quality continues to be such an issue in humanitarian projects and it is because the model of quality control in normal business is driven by its customers however, does not operate in the aid sector. Evaluation and monitoring in every building life cycle in reconstruction process is important to increase the quality of the aid project. Among all types of public buildings and facilities, hospital is considered as one of the most essential assets in disaster management. However, there is no list of criteria available yet to evaluate post-disaster hospital building performance. The objective of this study is to identify the key criteria for hospital building. A total of 116 respondents are collected from experts of built environment field and high level position staff in grade B hospital in the capital city of Aceh province, Banda Aceh. After conducting Cronbach's alpha coefficient test and factor analysis, total twenty-six criteria were found reliable and valid. Subsequent with the relative importance indices (RII) analysis, this study has come out with the top-fifteen most important criteria for post-disaster reconstruction building performance as in order: safety, health, control of environment impact, easiness, accessibility, engineering, building quality, staff and patient environment, comfort, functionality, building form and material, operational maintenance guideline, local institution capacity, architecture, disaster resilience, and the last criterion is sustainability. It is recommended to use these criteria for hospital building performance evaluation especially in disaster prone area. Future study is need to find out that the same criteria is applicable for other type of buildings and locations.

Nowadays, waxy crude oil becomes one of the major concerns in the oil and gas industry. The waxy crude oil affects the production and transportation of the crude oil from offshore to onshore. Differentiation by image visualization in determining the type of waxy crude oil, with or without wax sometimes appear rather similar between each other. Hence, a new method needs to be used to differentiate and classify the waxy crude oil type. An electronic nose (E-Nose) is one of the devices that could detect and measure the odor data of the waxy crude oil type using gas sensor array. This paper aims to classify four types of Malaysian waxy crude oil from different fields at room temperature. There are 16,000 odor data that has been collected by using the E-Nose. Then, the measured data were normalized and analyzed using boxplot analysis. The unique odor-profile for each type of waxy crude oil sample has been extracted and classified using intelligent classification technique. The four types of waxy crude oil have been classified 100% using k-NN intelligent classification technique with zero percentage of error in this paper.

This paper outlines a development of non-contact surface roughness measuring tool by using non-contact method. Major works involve development of the non-contact surface roughness measuring tool toward flat surface. Non-contact method was developed to prevent damage and scratch from the workpiece. In order to develop the tool, optical sensor is used as the input signal for microcontroller. Voltage signal received from optical signal is translated into surface roughness measurement value by using mathematical formula. C++ language programming is used as the code instruction for Arduino microcontroller. The results indicate that the developed tool is capable to measure surface roughness for flat surface metal with non-contact method.

The study was carried for combustion ionization flame testing on a K3-VE engine cylinder head. The main purpose of this experiment is to measure the speed of flame by using multiple ionization (ION) probe systems. The aim is to determine the feedback from the probe for engine control systems. The fuel that is use in this experiment is Liquified Petroleum Gas (LPG), because LPG gas causes a lot misfire during combustion due to its gaseous state and mixing. The testing probe was installed inside the engine combustion chamber with specific distance for the ION Probe. When the fuel is supplied in to the engine and the spark plug lights up the fuel, it produces a flame which is ionised, at the same time, when this flame touches the probe, it will generate a signal before quenching. The probe is connected to a circuit, when the signal is generated by the flame, the circuit will process the signal. A user interface was created to display the result of the experiment. Also, a camera was used to catch the flame to validate with the result. By using calculation, the speed of the flame can be determined to 20.60 m/s. The signal of the flame can be further used to improve the efficiency of the engine by adding a chip to the circuit to convert the signal and send to the vehicle Electronic Control Unit (ECU) to control the ignition time for better engine performance.

Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) has become an interesting topic in the automotive industry to develop the engines with clean emission characteristics. The usage of gasoline as a fuel to power up the vehicle will contribute to the heavy environmental problem. A single cylinder four-stroke spark ignition (SI) engine that fueled by LPG and gasoline are used to predict and analyze the combustion process in the cylinder. A zero dimensional models are most suitable analytical models for engine cycle simulation. The simulation program has been developed using MATLAB software by implementing a single-zone thermodynamic model. The first law of thermodynamics is applying into this model and Annand's model was used to compute the convection and radiation of heat transfer within the cylinder. The engine performance parameters computed including the in-cylinder pressure, gas temperature, net heat release, mass fraction burn, brake power, torque, indicated specific fuel consumption. Then, exhaust emission in the cylinder was predicted by the formation of emission model. The results of engine performance are compared between gasoline and LPG as a fuel. Results show LPG engine has contributed to the lower HC and NO_x emissions compared to gasoline. It proved that the development of simulation program is useful to calculate the engine performance at different operating points.

This project focuses on the modelling and verification of a tractor ride model as a part of tractor semi-trailer combination ride model development. The tractor ride model is established based on the three-axle tractor. The tractor ride model equations of motion, which consist of three degrees of freedom (DOF) of body motions and six DOF of unsprung mass motions are derived. The developed tractor ride model is simulated in Matlab-Simulink software. TruckSim software is used to verify the developed ride model by conducting the simulation on flat road condition. The vehicle model is simulated to travel at 90 km/h and hits 10 cm bump. The results of the study show that the dynamic behavior of the developed tractor ride model is closely followed the TruckSim tractor ride dynamic behavior. The percentage differences of RMS values between the developed and TruckSim model for all investigated parameters are less than 5%. It provides the confidence of utilizing the developed model established in this study for the purpose of developing the tractor semi-trailer combination model.

AAC system is an important and necessary system in a vehicle in giving thermal comfort to the automotive cars passenger by reducing the surrounding temperature. The experimental investigation on performance of AAC system using composite nanolubricant provides useful data for future development of automotive cars due to its efficiency in improving the system performance. The AAC test bench was developed and utilized from Perodua Kancil. Cooling capacity, compressor work and coefficient of performance (COP) of AAC system using pure lubricant and Al₂O₃-SiO₂/PAG composite nanolubricants had been investigated at different refrigerant charges (95 to 155g) and different speeds (900 to 2100 rpm). The result shows that the cooling capacity and COP of composite nanolubricants increased compared to pure lubricant. Meanwhile, the compressor work was reduced. Cooling capacity and COP are relatively increased by 59.91% and 7.72% respectively compared to based lubricant. The maximum reduction achievement for compressor work is by 9.35% with 155g refrigerant charge and at 2100 rpm. Therefore, Al₂O₃-SiO₂/PAG composite nanolubricants is recommended to be used as the compressor lubrication to enhance AAC performances system.

The increasing requirements to control emission and fuel economy are become important recently. Furthermore, the hazardous components produced by internal combustion engine forces many researchers to consider with alternative fuel which is environmental friendly and renewable sources. This study intends to investigate the performance and emission level by using palm oil blends with diesel operated on HCCI-DI engine. In this study, an experiment has carried out on single cylinder diesel engine with port fuel injection (PFI) attached at the intake manifold. Thus, PFI introduced to control combustion, it is plugged onto compression ignition engine, therefor it will completely covered 3 basic element; controlling fuel air mixing, controlling ignition timing and introducing new fuel. The HCCI-DI engine was operated at 1800 rpm with different fuel injection quantity; ω = 1.1, 1.4, 1.7 and lambda λ = 1.8, 2.3, 2.9. It has found that different fuel injection with difference palm oil blends percentages is significantly affects the engine efficiency. Blended fuels PO5 and PO10, produce higher nitrogen oxide (NO_x) and unburned hydrocarbon (UHC) emission exchange at DI mode. At HCCI-DI mode of combustion, blended fuels PO5 and PO10 increase NO_x and reduce UHC. Meanwhile carbon dioxide (CO₂) and carbon monoxide (CO) slightly reduce which no significant change for varies ω. The usage of palm oil blends on HCCI-DI engine increase the break specific fuel consumptions (BSFC) and brake mean effective pressure (BMEP) and reduce the engine performance include engine power compare with conventional diesel fuel. Thus, palm oil biodiesel operated in HCCI-DI mode of combustion have an optimal PFI quantity to operate in minimal emission levels.

The increasing energy consumption and the high rate exhaustion of fossilized fuels encourage researchers to find new alternative for the future generation. One of the possible solution to dampen the rate is by biodiesel-water emulsion. In the present study, emulsified biodiesel with 5% (B20W5), 10% (B20W10), 20% (B20W20) and 30% (B20W30) of water in volume were prepared with diesel-biodiesel blend (B20) to be used as fuel in an unmodified compression ignition direct injection engine. All tests were operated at engine speed of 2500 rpm and two different loads namely 20% and 40%. The in-cylinder pressure traces obtained from the series of experiments were used to investigate the trends of rate of heat release (RoHR), rate of pressure rise (RoPR) and mass fraction burned (MFB). The results show that the peak in-cylinder pressure was reduced by 5.9% and the maximum of RoHR is decreased by 8.8%. Furthermore the peak value of RoPR also decrease by 6.4%. All the results were achieved by using B20W5. Therefore, the emulsion of diesel-biodiesel blend is suitable as an alternative technique to improve combustion characteristics while lessen the dependency on fossil fuels.

A new transient-based advance towards single leak detection is proposed which requires a measurement station with an end at the pipe system. The method use the frequency response and gives adequate results using low frequency bandwidth. This research apply Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD) as the method denoising the noisy pressure transient signal before the signal further analyze using instantaneous frequency analysis. Therefore EMD is the way to decompose into Intrinsic Mode Function (IMF) from the signal. However it is difficult to select suitable IMF. Thus the paper proposed the implementation of Integrated Kurtosis-based algorithm Z-filter technique for that allows automatic selection of relevant and appropriates IMF. This work demonstrated the synthetic pressure transient signal generates using transmission line modelling (TLM) in order to test the effectiveness of Ikaz as the autonomous selection of IMF. This paper implement the Direct Quadrature as the instantaneous frequency analysis. A straight fluid network was designed using TLM fixing with higher resistance at some point act as a leak and connecting to the pipe feature (junction, pipefitting or blockage). The analysis results using Ikaz revealed that the method can be utilized as an automatic selection of intrinsic mode function (IMF) with lower than 2% error. Ikaz is recommended and advised to be implemented as automatic selection of intrinsic mode function (IMF) through DQ analysis.

The construction service industry is a sensitive and a complex industry and has a fairly high construction uncertainty, related to the development of processes, methods, construction techniques, and the natural conditions factor in construction activities, and often result to claims. Claims can occur both from users or contractor due to perception differences from the initial agreement that has been stated in a construction contract. Construction claims appear as a result of problems in aspects of organization, planning, and contracts. A claim can be described as an administrative tool to correct failures that occur in the construction process. The application of good claim management will be able to avoid dispute that will have an impact on cost overrun and time overrun. This study aims to identify the factors that cause the occurrence of claims during the construction work and identify the problems in each claim management process. The study was conducted by collecting questionnaire data to respondents, practitioners from the owner, contractor and consultant. Data analysis was performed using qualitative analysis (descriptive analysis) to determine the highest score of respondents' opinions regarding the causes of claims and problems that occur in each claim submission process so that an effective and efficient claim submission process is produced.

When there are sudden changes in fluid propagation in the pipeline system, pressure transient signal is generated. Due to the rapid pressure and fluctuation flow of the system such as opening and closing of valve rapidly. A few group of researchers had use the pressure transient signal to detect and locate any uncertainties in the system (leak and blockage). Empirical Mode decomposition (EMD) will be as the demonizing method of pressure transient signal before proceeding to be analyzed further by using instantaneous frequency analysis in this research. EMD might be the step of decomposing the signal into intrinsic mode function, but this method have difficulties in selecting a suitable IMF. This paper proposed the uses of Integrated Kurtosis-based Algorithm for z-filter Technique (Ikaz) for that allows automatic selection of suitable and relevant IMF. This work shows the artificial pressure transient signal generates using transmission line modelling (TLM) in order to test the effectiveness of Ikaz as the autonomous selection of IMF. This paper implements the Normalize Hilbert Transform (NHT) as the instantaneous frequency analysis. A straight fluid network was designed using TLM fixing with higher resistance at some point that act as a leak and connecting to the pipe feature such as junction, pipefitting or blockage. The analysis results using Ikaz show that the method can be implement as an automatic selection of intrinsic mode function (IMF) with percentage errors below 5%. Thus, Ikaz-kurtosis ratio is recommended to be implemented as automatic selection of intrinsic mode function (IMF) through NHT analysis.

X-by-wire technology is an advancement in automotive industry and is recognized by many countries in recent years. The in-wheel motor system is a type of drive-by-wire technology and it will be the main focused for the vehicle model in this paper. The steer-by-wire is a kind of by-wire technology in the automotive industry for the electric vehicle. [1] Steer-by-wire technology can be divided into two types which are two-wheel steering (2WS) and four-wheel steering (4WS). As we know, 2WS system is used in most of the vehicles.[2] However, the lower maneuverability will be shown in this type of vehicle during the vehicle spinning. The dynamic equation of motion was used for the simulation of vehicle movement.[3] The software of MATLAB Simulink was used to imitate that the effect of 4WD and 4WS EV during cornering.[4,5] The passive control was used in this simulation. As the result, the simulation indicated that 2WS EV is easy oversteered. After applied 4WS system, the vehicle oversteer problem was successfully solved by use parallel steering mode.

The demand on the wearable device in sport for health monitoring is increasing due to the awareness among the people while they undergo any physical activities. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to develop a wearable surface electromyogram device that can be used to measure and to monitor muscle activity during aerobic exercise. A 10-bit analog to digital converter (ADC) micro-controller board is selected to obtain and process the data sensed by Ag/AgCl wet electrodes. The obtained data is transmitted to the computer via Bluetooth's wireless technology using HC-05 master-slave module. In prior, the wearable is attached to the palmaris longus muscle in two different activities known as isometric and isotonic contractions. The fourth-order Butterworth filter is applied to eliminate the noise and filtering the raw signal in order to produce a clean EMG signal. Then, the device is compared with the commercial EMG to validate the signal obtained and to ensure the result is reliable. The results reveal that the high consistency of the voltage amplitude is successfully achieved in the high reliability of exercise voluntary contractions especially for isotonic and isometric. These types of contraction are distinguished able from the pattern of signal. The error of signal analysis is < 5% in validity test verified the accuracy of this device compared with the other device available in the market. This device is potentially can be used for upper extremity of aerobic exercise in measuring the muscle contraction, and it is beneficial for the biomedical and sports application environment.

Malaysia is active in automotive manufacturing activity for decades. The needs in continuing development of lean manufacturing tools are not exempt to be pressurised, which enable the regional demand for vehicles. Several research studies clearly indicate significant opportunities for efficiency improvement in the automotive industry through implementation and a higher level of lean management utilization. Apparently, there is still a small number of study for Lean Management Tools in a Malaysian Automotive Assembly Line. The emphasis for the study is to investigate practices of lean tools applied in the production line and proposing an implementation of lean management tools available to apply in the Malaysian automotive production line work practice. A review study of literature from different journal publication sources related to lean management tools was made to understand more on how to best identify practices of lean tools. From this literature study review, three lean management tools have been investigated and identified such as 5S, Value Stream Mapping (VSM) and Work Standardization are to be studied for proposed application in the Malaysian automotive assembly production line. The impact of implementing lean tools is studied based on the results gathered from previous studies related to 5S, VSM and Work Standardization. The conclusion of this paper is to investigate the practices and implementation of Lean Management Tools in the Malaysian Automotive Assembly. It is to be suggested that a future case study on the proposed lean tools using time study and observational survey to be implemented in Malaysian automotive assembly line and measuring the improvements gained from utilizing the selected lean tools. The result from this review is that among the lean tools highlighted here, 5S is applied everywhere in an automotive assembly line, supported by VSM with its overview of the whole process and also Work Standardization to standardize the method and flow of work in an assembly line and improve the consistency of work. Therefore, concluding this study would be the importance of 5S, VSM and Work Standardization as the implemented tools in an automotive assembly line, in view of overcoming the challenges of the constant change in customer demand.

An earthquake with 9.0 SR faced Aceh, followed by a tsunami in the coastal areas of Aceh, causing severe damage, especially in the city of Banda Aceh. The worst affected area was the Sub-district Meuraxa because it was directly adjacent to the sea. In-depth and ongoing evaluations were needed to solve these problems. In this case, POE was used as a study. POE is a process of evaluating the performance of buildings, occupants and their environment. POE consists of three aspects, namely functional, technical, and behavior aspects. There are three levels in this study, namely indicative, investigative, and diagnostic levels. The level used was investigative because it was a continuation of previous study with two comparative objects. So, the formulation of the problem in this study was to look at the performance of the elements of POE and the response of occupants of the house. The method used in this study was Mix Method Research which was a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods with descriptive statistical techniques which were then analyzed using theory and related references so as to produce a kind of comparative study. The study results were as follows; technical aspects which included structural systems, lighting, and interior finishing as a whole having better performance than comparable objects. Functional aspects included organizational structure, communication, workflow, spatial organization, and circulation and support of human having better performance than comparable objects. While the behavioral aspects which included productivity and territoriality, privacy and interaction, perception, image and meaning, and cognition and orientation tended to be the same as the objects of comparison, it could be said that the behavioral aspects in this study began to move in a more positive direction.

Lower extremity disorders is associated with prolonged and awkward postures such as kneeling, squatting and stooping. Current study aims to examine the risk factors of awkward postures among pineapple plantation workers in Malaysia by using Ovako Working Posture Analysis System (OWAS). The postural analysis output from OWAS is then compared and validated by using Surface Electromyography (sEMG). There are 103 pineapple plantation workers participated in this study with an average working experience of 1 to 3 years. Based on OWAS findings, it shows for an overall distribution, planting, manual weeding and harvesting are the tasks fell under Action Category (AC) 3 which indicating distinctly harmful and (AC) 4 which indicating extremely harmful. The readings of muscle activity during selected postures show that erector spinae and multifidus muscle are actively contracted during kneeling, squatting and stooping posture. The results from this study signify that long exposure to these postures can increase the likelihood of having WMSDs such as back pain and lower limb injuries among pineapple plantation workers. This study suggests that ergonomic intervention such as mechanization of tools and equipments should be implemented in order to eliminate or reduce poor postures. In case of incapability for any mechanization, adequate and effective training should be provided for the workers as they can apply the knowledge through their job.

In recent years, engine downsizing becomes popular in modern vehicles since rising demands for less consuming vehicle and more stringent emission regulations. Along with this trend, turbocharging also gains popularity as a method to increase the output of small size engine hence enables it to produce comparable output to bigger displacement engine. In this paper, recent turbocharger studies in three major area that are heat transfer studies, flow studies and mechanical studies are reviewed. In heat transfer studies, the findings from experimental and modelling of heat transfer are presented. For flow studies, the reviews are separated to the different part of the turbocharger and method of study. While for mechanical studies in turbocharger, the mechanical losses in turbocharger was reviewed. At the end of this review, the area of interest for the next study will be concluded.

Efficiencies and the productivity of the assembly line are crucial in the manufacturing sector. It is very unusual opportunity to visualise and analyse the production system, which used in defence manufacturing sector. This research study focuses on the performance of an existing production line for Malaysia's automotive defence manufacturing industry. The main issues that arise are first, the delivery is always behind the schedule and second, the human factor that contributes to the increase of rejected parts and slow down the production line. WITNESS simulation will be utilised to analyse the dynamic issues associated with the whole performance of the manufacturing system. A methodology for production layout improvement will bring into notice. DELMIA simulation can improve employee's working condition, which is to optimise the production line efficiency. The assembly line can be better in many ways, for example, the arrangement of working layout, the summit of the workplace and massive machines handling method by the worker. All of these are imperative to increase the efficiency of the employees. Continuous improvement of the proposed methodology includes progress in model design, training of operators, follow-up of implementing changes and investigations in the measurement of manufacturing line efficiencies.

Paraffin deposition in the crude oil production pipeline has been an alarming problem to the flow assurance community. This phenomenon causes a tremendous amount of material loss in the production and substantial resources are expended to resolve these flow assurance problems—which included the chemical treatment. This study examined an agricultural non-ionic silane-based surfactant and its blends (with silica nanoparticles) as a flow improver using Malaysian light crude oil (42.4°API). In particular, this study performed the following experimental measurements: wax appearance temperature, pour point, viscosity, and FTIR spectroscopic analysis. The result showed that the surfactant-nanoparticles blend affected the viscosity (significant reduction by approximately 67 %) within certain temperature range and were able to depress both pour point (to 4°C) and wax appearance temperature (15.6°C). It was also revealed that the most potent blend consisted 400 ppm of silane-based surfactant and 200 ppm of SiO₂ nanoparticles. The study also evaluated the underlying mechanisms for the variation of viscosity through FTIR spectroscopic analysis.

Magnetorheological finishing (MRF) process is capable to fabricate an ultra-fine surface from flat to three-dimensional profile structures using Magnetorheological polishing fluid MRPF). MRPF is a smart fluid that can change from liquid to near solid state under the influences of magnetic field. Abrasive particle is essential material in MRPF. Three main methods in MRF process are reviewed including composition of the MRPF, rheological properties and polished surface quality.

Leak detection become crucial part in water management services due to strenuous work in identification of leak location for pipeline networks. This paper focused on leak identification and localization using Teiger-Kaiser Energy Operator (TKEO) as instantaneous frequency analysis (IFA) while Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD) as decomposition method with implementation of Integrated Kurtosis Algorithm for Z-Filter (Ikaz) to Kurtosis ratio as the automatic selection criterion for intrinsic mode function (IMF). Test rig construct inside laboratory as testing site using 67.90-metre Medium Density Polyethylene (MDPE) pipe. In order to create an artificial leak, pinhole is drill at 19.75-metre distance from point of analysis that is fire hydrant attached with pressure sensor. Experiment conduct by using two variation of pressure that are 2bar and 4bar. As the result, with percentage of error less than 6%, combination of TKEO as IFA and efficiency of Ikaz performed well in locating the position of leak and outlet of pipeline system.

Transient event usually happen due to pressure surge inside water pipeline network by either opening or closing valve rapidly or water hammer phenomena. This paper focus on identification of leak signature using Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD) with the implementation of Ikaz-kurtosis ratio while Teager Kaiser Energy Operator (TKEO) use as instantaneous frequency analysis (IFA). Two synthetic signal with different pipe characteristics was construct using transmission line modelling (TLM). It is show that Ikaz-kurtosis ratio give good result in selecting the intrinsic mode function (IMF) after EMD decomposed the signal into a series of IMFs. TKEO as post processing analysis extract all the information inside the signal that contaminated with noise. Its show that leakage position can be localize with maximum error less 7.3%. Meanwhile, Outlet position recorded 3.4% maximum. This conclude that this method apply for synthetic signal is acceptable for leakage detection.

In recent years, carbon fiber-reinforced polymer (CFRP) materials are gaining tremendous attention by industries especially in aerospace industry for product structures due to the superior material properties such as high strength, low weight and corrosion. This study presents a research on the influence of machining parameters utilizing uncoated tungsten carbide router or burrs tool towards surface quality during edge trimming of a specific CFRP material. CFRP panel of 10.31 mm in thickness with the total of 38 number of plies has been chosen to be the main study material. A famous statistical method namely Taguchi Method (L4) has been deployed to plan the overall experimental design. Two main factors investigated in this study were spindle speed and feed rate. Surface roughness measurement was taken using Mitutoyo Surftest SJ-410. Moreover, optical microscope Nikon MM-800 is utilized to further observe the trimmed surfaces. The result reveals that the spindle speed was the most influential parameter towards the trimmed surface quality. Run no. 3 (R3) generated approximately 2.5 times better Ra value than Run no. 3 (R2) at constant feed rate (1500 mm/min) but vary in spindle speed by the difference of 3000 rpm. From further observations of trimmed surface through optical microscope, obvious matrix degradation and wrench areas were spotted on the R2 trimmed surface compared to the R3. From ANOVA analysis, spindle speed was also indicated as the significant factor. Details results elaborated and discussed further in this paper.

Automotive engine cooling system handle a lot of excessive heat produced during engine operation. Furthermore, it regulates engine surface temperature for engine optimum efficiency. Recent advancement in engine for power forced engine cooling system to develop new strategies to improve its performance efficiency. Also to reduce fuel consumption along with controlling engine emission to mitigate environmental pollution norms. This paper throws light on parameters which analyse the radiator performance at high coolant temperature that is below 80° C and the comparison data from experimental and one-dimensional analysis data. A literature review has been done and ways were identified how to enhance radiator performance. In addition, A coolant is normally chemically combined with a high boiling point liquid to form a compounded fluid. This compounded fluid function as an antifreeze agent against extremely cold conditions and as well as solves the problem of overheating during hot weather. A coolant with relatively high boiling temperature can cool faster as the engine gets hotter. During an operation of an internal combustion engine, about a third of heat energy produced are considered as unwanted heat that ends up in the cooling system. Thermal conductivity values are maximum at 0.9% concentrations.

Stress-induced hyperglycaemia is commonly occurred in the intensive care unit (ICU). It is known that the intensive insulin therapy (IIT) has successfully managed the blood glucose level within the targeted band. However, modifications on the current practice need to be considered to minimize the risk of hypoglycaemia and mortality. Thus, the aim of this study is to assess the performance of a new practice known as Stochastic Targeted (STAR) Protocol in managing blood glucose levels in Malaysia ICU setting. STAR is a tablet-computer based protocols that provides patient-specific glucose control framework accounting for patient variability with a stochastically derived maximum 5% risk of hypoglycaemia events. A retrospective 92 non-diabetes patient's data who underwent IIT were identified. Patient's blood glucose levels, exogenous insulin and nutrition inputs including patient demographics were extracted from the ICU charts to create virtual patients by using physiologically mathematical model. Three trials were simulated with controlled goal feed (GF) and without GF. Only one type of nutrition is considered in this study which is Glucerna. The outcomes will be compared in terms of %BG within the targeted band of 4.4 to 10.0 mmol/L, the total number of BG measurements, and the % of severe hypoglycaemia. The results indicate that STAR virtual trial with controlled GF reduced the risk of hypoglycaemia to 3% and the clinical burden up to 1630 hours while maintaining BG within the targeted band. The total number of BG measurements also decreased to 5384 from 7038. Thus, the implementation of STAR protocol in the Malaysia ICU is beneficial and it is proven safe while aiding nurses and physicians in reducing the clinical burden and medical cost in treating stress-induce hyperglycaemia in the demanding ICU setting.

Each electric motor has a temperature rating that is related to the insulation grade of its winding. Exceeding the maximum temperature will lead to motor destruction. In this study, the temperature rise of components in a 250W brushed DC motor including the brush, bearing, permanent magnet and casing are observed as the speed of the motor changes. Knowing that the speed is proportional to the voltage supplied, the temperature of these components was observed at voltages ranging from 8 to 24 V with no load. The results show that despite running without load, the current increase proportionally due to resistance torque that increases with the speed. The maximum temperature attained in the brush at the maximum speed tested at 55°C. The following orders are the bearing, casing and permanent magnet. The order are the same regardless the speed level.

An exhaust structure is experienced dynamic loads caused by engine operational and road surface condition that affected its durability and dynamic performance. Hence, the purpose of this study is to perform finite element (FE) modelling of exhaust structure and the used of updating approach to improve its dynamic behaviour. Due to its design, exhaust structure is built-up from several parts connected with welded joints. These welded joints significantly contribute to the dynamic behaviour of the structure. Four types of element connector that are RBE2, CBAR, CBEAM and CELAS have been used to replicate FE model of welded joint on the structure. Modal parameters (natural frequency and mode shape) of the FE model have been obtained from normal mode analysis using finite element analysis (FEA) software, MSC. Nastran/Patran. The precision of numerical predicted result from FEA is compared with its measured counterpart. The measured test data obtained through experimental modal analysis (EMA) using impact hammer and roving accelerometers under free-free boundary conditions. Under correlation process, CBAR element connector was chosen to model the welded joint due to its accurate prediction of natural frequency and contains updating parameters. FE model updating process was performed to improve the correlation between EMA and FEA. Ahead of updating process, sensitivity analysis was done to select the most sensitive updating parameter. As a result, total percentage error of natural frequency for updated CBAR model is reduced significantly from 8.74 % to 3.45 %. Consequently, CBAR element connector was chosen as the most reliable joint element in FE model to represent welded joint on exhaust structure.

This study presents the descriptive analysis of students' performance based on the cumulative grade point average (CGPA) of the entry grade and the CGPA achieved throughout their study duration until graduation. The data analysed are students from all bachelor degree programme at Universiti Malaysia Pahang of 2011, 2012 and 2013 cohorts. Components related to academic performance such as gender, entry qualification, CGPA (entry, all semesters), academic programme and cohort are analysed using the descriptive statistics. The results show that students from Sijil Tinggi Pelajaran Malaysia (STPM) performs very well academically with mean CGPA of 3.30 throughout the study period as compared to students from diploma (CGPA:2.97), matriculation (CGPA:2.88) or Sijil Tinggi Agama Malaysia (STAM; CGPA:2.71). The findings of the study can be used by the university's administration to review intake policies and plan for the intervention program which could help improve the students' academic performance.

The dynamic motion of internal fluid flow caused an interaction between the fluid's dynamic forces and a structure's inner wall. This phenomenon will induce unstable vibration into the system and recently called flow-induced vibration. In this study, an experimental analysis was performed to identify the changes in the characteristics of vibration measured on an automotive radiator resulting from internal flow in a circular heated tube. The vibration result is presented in terms of Power Spectral Density (PSD) that shows the strength of the energy variations as a function of frequency. Water was used as the working fluid operate with engine temperature range from 80 to 90 °C. The air flow velocities of radiator cooling fan were varied from 1.0 to 1.9 m/s and the water flowrates were 2.2, 2.8, 3.2 and 3.8 l/min. Experimental results are presented and indicated that PSD values are dependant to the fluid flowrate. It is also analysed that relationship between vibrations (PSD) and flowrate is influenced by the change of radiator cooling fan speed. Apart from that, the paper also develops a set of vibration features that will assist in identifying low flow conditions in automotive radiator.

Bolted joint commonly being used as a mechanical joint to connect two or more mechanical components which bring an interest to this study. The complexity of joint element plays an important role in the dynamic investigation. Structural damage happens and often it's too late to react to it and early detection of structure failure (damage) is beneficial. This paper aims to study the differences between undamaged and damage frame structure with bolted joints. Frame structure consists of 4 angle bar and 16 flat bars fabricated with stainless steel material is used. Total of 32 pcs of M6 screw and nuts are used together with structure. Damage often alter the mode shapes and reduce the natural frequencies. Natural frequencies and mode shapes of both undamaged and damaged data obtained by experimental modal analysis is correlated. Frequency drop is observed on natural frequencies after being correlated and as well as the mode shapes changed occurs on the undamaged and damages structure. Frame structure with damage on the joints able to detect the frequency drops and alter the modes shapes.

Motorcycles built from multiple materials such as steel and aluminium that formed a welded of beams to construct the chassis. The frame is designed by combining the part-by-part saddle, handlebar and wheel that are attached together. In this study, the identification of structural dynamics study for motorcycle chassis was conducted to identify modal properties such as natural frequencies and mode shapes. This could be achieved by using two different analysis approaches; Finite Element Analysis (FEA) and Experimental Modal Analysis (EMA). For FEA analysis, 3D modeling of the chassis frame is needed and modelled using CAD software. Normal mode analysis was run on modelled structure to determine modal properties after meshing type and properties of materials declared. Impact hammer testing using roving accelerometer method was conducted for EMA study and comparison of modal properties with FEA is carried out. Discrepancies that appeared after correlation among two approaches attempted to be reduced by performing model updating procedure and it was successfully reduced the average percentage of error to be less than 10%. The results show that the model updating was an effective technique for improving the discrepancy that may exist due to modelling issue and material properties prediction in FEA. This study clearly shows that model updating technique is an effective way of reducing the discrepancies between EMA and FEA.

Braking is the necessary system need to install as the safety feature for the moving transportation. Using the mechanical braking only as primary braking system in Electric Transportation (ET) is insufficient due to some issues such as low strength users hand gripping and abruptly tire locking during braking especially on wet surface condition. In this paper, the performance between mechanical and electrical braking which is by using dynamic braking concept is proposed to enhance the braking performance of Electric Powered Wheelchair (EPW). The experiments were conducted during descending on the slope under wet and dry pavements. From the results of slip ratio, the slipping time between mechanical and dynamic braking in dry pavement is recorded 0.9 seconds and 0.7 seconds respectively. Meanwhile, it is observed that tire is fully locked-up for mechanical braking under the wet surface. However, by using the dynamic braking, the wheel does not lock-up and the slipping time was recorded 1.4 seconds. It can be considered that, mechanical and dynamic braking give their own merit. The high braking torque from mechanical braking is suitable to use under the dry pavement for the short stopping distance. The other sides, braking under the wet pavement, dynamic braking is more efficient compare to the mechanical braking in term of short slipping time and does not cause tire to lock-up while braking.

Exfoliation of pencil graphite core throughout electrolysis process is considered as one of the simple and friendly method to synthesis graphene from graphite. In this research, sodium sulphate (Na₂SO₄) was used as an electrolyte to investigate the effect on pencil graphite core with different grades for exfoliation process. Pencil graphite core was applied as both anode and cathode electrodes and exposed in 0.1 mol of Na₂SO₄ solution and followed with sonication in DMF solution. The morphology of exfoliated graphite was characterized by FESEM and TEM image. It was found that higher pencil grade produced more exfoliated powder as compared to lower grade pencil, and morphology investigation revealed that the exfoliated powder can produced graphene in nanoplatelet forms.

Manufacturing sectors are the major industrial sector which contribute to the development of the country. The automotive manufacturing industry is a global industry which has high competition all over the world and contribute in large amount of revenue to the country. From the review, the management of automotive industries faced a few problems relates to the assembly line and the workers. The workers are exposed to hazard which resulting from unsuitable tasks or inappropriate workplace. The purpose of the study is to identify the occupational risks at automotive manufacturing company and recommend the ergonomic working condition at the workplace. This study is carried out through interview session, observation, videotaping and assessment method using Rapid Upper Limb Assessment (RULA). Based on the findings, it shows that the subjects are exposed to extremely high risks and the changes need to be done immediately. The occupational risks will lead to the presence of Work-Musculoskeletal Disorders (WMSDs) which cause absenteeism, employee turnover and the production drops. There are a few factors which causes the occurrence of WMSDs which are repetitive tasks, awkward postures and strenuous physical load or force exertion. The implementation of ergonomics in the workplace is important to avoid the presence of WMSDs.

The utilization of thermal energy storage in the thermal absorber applications has been increasingly important especially in the application where there is a mismatch between energy demand and energy supply. This technology implies that the heat is stored during charging or discharging process through melting and freezing of the thermal energy storage material so that it can be used in the future. This paper presents the outcome of the experimental investigation on the performance of cross-matrix absorber (CMA) utilizing paraffin as the thermal energy storage material. Experiments were carried out by exposing the CMA under different artificial solar radiation (300 W/m², 500 W/m², 700 W/m² and 900 W/m²) for 30 minutes followed by 30 minutes of discharging process. Based on the observation, it was found that smaller mass flow rate value of 0.005 kg/s gave the highest temperature output regardless of the intensity of solar radiation as compared to the other after 30 minutes of charging process. In terms of heat gain by the thermal absorber, it was concluded that the highest mass flow rate of 0.01 kg/s passing through the absorber lead to the higher heat gain by the CMA, hence prolonged the cooling down / discharging period as shows by the result, where case with maximum mass flow rate (0.01 kg/s) consistently contributed to the higher heat gain by the absorber. This feature is very useful in the solar thermal collector related applications such as crop drying and domestic building heating. The heat gain by the absorber is also contributed by the intensity of the solar radiation.

The thermal vacuum chamber is a specialized chamber to test any mechanical system, which is planned to be launched to outer space. The research is about designing a new thermal vacuum chamber to accommodate a 125-U CubeSat satellite. The role is to create a space condition environment with ultra-high vacuum in high and low temperature and induced radiation. Liquid nitrogen is utilized as the thermal medium. The proposed design is simulated and tested acoording to the working parameters. The velocity result indicates a sensible output velocity of 3.841 m/s with an input velocity of 10m/s. The pressure contour provides a maximum of 13,280 Pa.

Experiments were conducted to identify the Heat Transfer Coefficient (HTC) in saturated pool boiling of single and hybrid water-based nanofluids. In these experiments, Al₂O₃ and SiO₂ nanoparticles were selected and diluted into two separate single nanofluids, and they were mixed in a different ratio from 0:100, 25:75, 50:50, 75:25 and 100:0 percent to achieve a final total concentration of 0.001 vol. %. Successively, the mixtures were used to obtain the HTC values through experimental works. In the present work, it was found that in the lowest concentration (0.00025 vol.%) of Al₂O₃ nanofluid, the HTC enhanced considerably but deteriorated for SiO₂ nanofluid. Separately, as for the hybrid nanofluids, the HTCs were dramatically enhanced at the initial stage but slowly deteriorated once the time variation increased, especially in a higher ratio of SiO₂ nanofluid. The deposition of the nanoparticles onto the surface heater suggested being the main factor, where in the present case, the significant coexisting effect of the deposited hybrid nanoparticles (Al₂O₃ and SiO₂) on the heated surface to the changes of ΔT_W due to different nanoparticles properties.

Microwave hybrid heating (MHH) has been recognized for the soldering process especially with lead-free solder alloy. This study seeks to investigate the effect of the different amount of susceptor on the Sn-3.0Ag-0.5Cu-Copper (SAC305-Cu) joint performance by using the MHH method. The susceptor material that was used to facilitate microwave heating in this study was Silicone Carbide (SiC). Different amount of SiC was used to compare its effect on the intermetallic compound (IMC) formed and shear strength at the solder joint. Domestic microwave with operating frequency 2.45GHz and 800W was used to join the solder and Cu substrate for 5, 6 and 7 minutes. Characterization of the samples was carried out using an optical microscope, image analyzer, and lap shear test. The microstructural study showed that scallop type structure of Cu₆Sn₅ was found at the SAC305/Cu interface after soldering with MHH technique. Thinnest Cu₆Sn₅ IMC (14.909 mm) were obtained by soldering with 6 g of SiC for 6 minutes while highest shear strength was observed when 4 g of SiC was used for soldering for 7 minutes (26.71 MPa).

Being the main and safest oil and gas transportation method globally, the integrity and condition of pipeline system is very crucial. The offline existing maintenance method might have consumed more time and risky as it does not detect the flaws immediately after it is formed. This paper focused on the detection of the leak detection in pipes using the Fiber Bragg Grating pressure transducer. Two different sizes of artificial leak were introduced on the pipe in order to measure the applicability of the FBG sensor in detecting the leak in a pipe. The FBG signals were acquired on a galvanized steel pipe in lab scale size equipped with 5 pairs of valve. During the experimental work execution, the FBG sensor was attached on the pressure transducer that is linked to the pipeline. Findings showed that bigger leak size contributed to higher voltage drop in the pipe which was 0.0075 V compared to 0.0017 V. This study shows that FBG is a reliable method to be utilised in leak detection because it is very sensitive towards pressure changes in pipe. The results also showed that FBG exhibits good uniformity.

Public bus has become the needs to the people especially in the city area. In Kuala Terengganu city, the public bus service was created to upgrade the public transport system in Terengganu State by providing city bus service called as 'BAS KITe'. Concerning of the real world city, driving cycles for BAS KITe is needed in order to improve the energy consumption and emissions for every operation routes. Driving cycle represents a traffic behavior in a specific area or city. The objectives of this paper are; to characterize and develop driving cycle of BAS KITe in Kuala Terengganu city along its operation route, to analyze fuel economy and emissions using the driving cycle developed, and to compare the fuel economy and emissions with conventional bus and split single mode plug-in hybrid electric bus (PHEB) using Vehicle System Simulation Tool Development (AUTONOMIE) software. The methodology involves three major steps, which are route selection, data collection using on-road measurement method and driving cycle development using k-means method. Through the analysis of energy consumption and emissions, real world driving cycle is designed with 41 final micro-trips and it can be proved that PHEB can reduce the energy consumption thereby minimizing the impact on the environment and economy.

Biofuel has the potential to be used as an alternative fuel compared to petroleum gasoline for the purpose increase performance and reducing emissions. The objective of the study is to evaluate performance and emission on properties of 10–30% fusel oil blends with pure gasoline (Ron 95) at 3000 rpm. In this experiment, three fuels were designed from fusel oil to test engine performance and emission. The haltech ECU was an escalation to set ignition, injection timing and injection mass when using fusel oil blends to reach stoichiometric level. In this study, pure gasoline was set as a reference. The experiments were conducted on 1.8L turbocharged 4-cylinder, spark ignition engine, port injection and coupled with 100 kW eddy current dynamometer. During engine testing, the throttle position was applied to 10–40%. As a result, averaged BMEP increase at 11.9%, 17.8% and 21.3% for F10, F20 and F30 respectively compared to gasoline. The VE and BSFC averaged increased 8.3% and 6.17% compared to pure gasoline for 10–40% engine load. The emissions for CO and HC on these observations increased while the NOx decreased when fusel oil blends were utilized. The recommendation used in study is low proportion blends to assess different properties for engine test.

World energy demand, which is amplified multi-fold day-by-day due to the transportation, urbanization, industrial revolution and electricity generation give severe environmental consequences. The effective solution to steer clear of this problem is by using biodiesel-water emulsification. In the present study, pure diesel, diesel-biodiesel blend (B20) and emulsified diesel-biodiesel blend with different percentage of water 5% (B20E5), 10% (B20E10), 20% (B20E20) and 30% (B20E30) were prepared to be operated in a diesel engine to study engine performance in terms of brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) and brake thermal efficiency (BTE), and emissions in terms of nitrogen oxides (NO_x), carbon dioxides (CO₂) and hydrocarbons (HC). Emulsifiers Sorbitan Monoleate (Span 80) and Polyoxyethylene Sorbitan Monoleate (Tween 80) were used to prepare emulsion fuels. The engine was run at constant engine speed 2500 rpm and three different loads, 20%, 40% and 60%. The results showed that highest BSFC reduction of 6.68% achieved by B20E5. The B20E30 give highest improvement in term of BTE which is 32.56% compared to diesel. A total of 17.29% reduction of NO_x gained by B20E30 compared to conventional diesel. Therefore, the emulsification of biodiesel blend is suitable as an alternative technique to improve engine performance and emissions.

To compete in international market, companies must produce better quality products with minimum cost. In order to achieve it, one of the supporting factors is a good and efficient inventory management among company and its distributions. For paying system in the inventory management, the companies are using syari'at and conventional scheme. Identical Delivery Quantity (IDQ) model was employed, to calculate minimum inventory cost for both company and its distributors that are mutually coordinated and collaborated. This model was developed by considering four different interest rates in the credit scheme, such as annuities, flat rate, sliding rate, and murabaha. The objective is to calculate total inventory cost for both company and its distributors with the credit schemes as the payment method. Numerical example of a real case was applied in the developed models. It shows that the murabahah is cheaper than another interest rates and it is more applicable in real system to calculate inventory cost with credit scheme as the payment method.

The earthquake load in structures is assumed as a low-cycle loading type load in structures that may cause low-cycle fatigue in earthquake resisting structures. Hence, this paper is to highlight and compare the fatigue properties of refurbish pseudoelastic shape memory alloy (SMA) and structural steel for used as seismic reinforcement features in concrete structures. This experiment study on the stress (S) against the number of cycles to failure (N) known as an S-N curve were conducted using INSTRON 8801 Servo hydraulic Fatigue Testing System with 3Hz of loading frequency with the stress varies between 0.9F_yield and 1.45F_yield for 8 SMA samples and 2 steel samples with stress varies of 0.64F_yield and 1.15F_yield. Two type of SMA samples were used including three 12.7mm SMA samples with A_f-25, 6 SMA samples with A_f-6.3 with 12 mm diameter respectively. As a result, the structural steel were observed could with stand approximately 93710 cycles before failure if loaded up to its yield stress, while SMA of diameter 12.7mm can withstand until 19040.75 cycles. Type 1 of refurbish SMA rebar that were reused shows a much better behaviour against fatigue than structural steel rebar and is more reliable in seismic periodic loads. However, for second type refurbish and reused of SMA shows the vice versa and can only sustain maximum 23674.25 cycles.

This paper presents the effect of different parameters of fibre laser soldering on interfacial reaction of two types of lead-free solder fabrication on Cu pad. The objective of this paper is to study the intermetallic compound thickness (IMC) formation and wetting angle of two different types of solder fabrication when it was exposed to varies of laser power and scanning time. A fibre laser with 200W continues wave (CW) was used in this experiment to form a joining between SAC305 solder wire and printed copper board. A continuous laser power was ranged between 72W to 88W and scanning time of 1.5s and 2.5s were chosen to create joining. Flux was used in the laser soldering experiment in order to gain uniform heat distribution throughout the solders. The mechanical properties were observed by using optical and metallurgical microscope. Results showed that SAC305 solder powder performing good wetting angle with smallest value of 18.18° meanwhile, the smallest wetting angle for solder wire is 26.12° and in terms of IMC layer comparison, solder powder has more thinner IMC layer with value of 1.1 µm compared to SAC305 solder wire which is 2.9 µm. Thus, it is showed that solder powder improved the solder joint properties compared to conventional solder wire when exposed to laser soldering.

This research highlighting the novel properties of pseudo-elastic Ni-Ti bar owing to their ability to reverse macroscopically inelastic deformation during earthquake known as recentering capability and large elastic strain capacity which originated from the reversible austenite to martensite phase transformation. Hence, this paper presented and evaluates the cyclic properties of pseudo elastic Ni–Ti shape memory alloys to assess their prospective use for seismic applications to be exploited as seismic resistant design and retrofit. In addition, the correlation of hysteretic behavior of Ni-Ti alloy in terms of cyclic loading number and history, mechanical properties at ambient temperature, equivalent damping, energy dissipation and recovery stress were evaluate. The NiTi bar with weight percentage of Ti-43.98 at. % Ni 56.02 and diameter of 8 mm. The tensile cyclic test obtained demonstrated a rounded loading curve based on a 0.2% offset. The as received bar exhibited superior pseudo-elastic behaviour and recentering through repeated cycling without significant degradation or permanent deformation but low energy dissipation due to narrow hysteresis while the steel rebar shows vice versa. Experimental results show potential for the use of SMAs in seismic applications and provide areas for continued research. It was conclude that the as-received pseudo elastic Ni-Ti bar is suitable use for seismic mitigation despite of their ability to undergo cyclical strains is 6% which is greater than 5%, with minimal residual strain, 0.15% which is less than 1%.

This paper presents a review paper of concrete beam reinforced with SMA hybrid with steel. Existing literature presented a number of analytical and experimental studies on the use of SMAs using pseudoplastic to be embedded in reinforced concrete beam for crack recovery. However, little research has been carried out on the use of pseudoelastic SMA as reinforcement as partial replacement in reinforced concrete beam. Hence the feasibility of pseudoelastic SMAs under austenitic temperature window and several components of RC building structures to exhibit stable superelastic under austenite crystallization were investigate. This paper is to review the feasibility study NiTi SMA as reinforcement rebar for seismic mitigation. This research investigates the application of concrete beams reinforced with pseudoelastic SMA longitudinal bars to evaluate the applicability of SMAs as alternative reinforcement, and to provide benchmark tests against the microstructure investigation to the performance of pseudoelasticNiTi used Malaysian ambient temperature for seismic mitigation design. The feasibility study of the superelasticNiTi SMA reinforcement bar for hybrid reinforcing of concrete beam also reviewed The factors influence the design and performance parameter of SMA in reinforced concrete beam, Comparison of NiTi, Steel and other Alloys, advantages and disadvantages, drawbacks and restraint of using pseudoelastic SMAs were also were studied.

Empty fruit bunches (EFB) contribute the most to the biomass waste produced from palm oil industries. Biomass waste is made up of cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin. By having high cellulose content, it has great potential for cellulose production. However, the cellulose extraction process has yet to be optimized. Therefore, the study on the operating conditions in extracting cellulose from EFB takes place by understanding the sodium hydroxide (NaOH) soaking process prior to steam explosion pre-treatment. The effects of retention time on the hot water extraction (HWE) treatment and NaOH concentration on the alkaline extraction (AE) treatment in term of the amount of dissolved sugar were observed. The chemical properties of original fibre and treated fibre were analysed by Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) Spectroscopy and the surface morphology were observed using scanning electron microscopy (SEM). In this study, it is found that the best condition for alkaline extraction was at 10% alkaline concentration and the FTIR spectroscopy shows that there a no changes on the chemical structure of the fibre. SEM also shows the changes on the surface morphology of the fibre. Showing that the sodium hydroxide assisted steam explosion pre-treatment does greatly influence the further process

Biodiesel is a clean-burning alternative fuel but it is susceptible to lower calorific value due to autoxidation in the presence of oxygen, which hinders its widespread use. Organic germanium Ge-132 is a prospective solution to this problem. It is expected that Ge-132 may affect the energy content of blending biodiesel. This paper presents an experimental investigation of the effect of Ge-132 addition to palm biodiesel on physicochemical properties. Three concentrations including 5ppm, 8ppm and 10ppm added to BD20 to study their fuel physical characteristics effect. The fuel and additive was blend by using ultrasonic emulsifier for 2 minutes before experiment. The results show that BD20 with additive Ge-132 produced 0.48%– 1.07% higher density and 0.7%–1.7% higher kinematic viscosity and 0.09%-0.6% higher calorific value compared to BD20 without the additive. The higher calorific value blending biodiesel attribute by the carbon content on Ge-132. Compared to BD20, the blended biodiesel with additive Ge-132 produce higher density, kinematic viscosity and calorific value which attribute the increase the performance and better fuel consumption.

The demand for growing fuel in everyday life and its risk requires a serious problem for this world. Great attention is needed to solve this problem. Biodiesel considered as alternatives to minimize the usage of conventional fuels. However, by using biodiesel, the main drawbacks are like higher density, lower heat value, high-level consumption and high nitrogen oxides that contribute to produce less engine performance and increase the exhaust emission. In order to avoid the above disadvantages, fuel additives help plays a very important role in minimizing the disadvantages of biodiesel and maintaining international fuel standards. In this experimental study, the organic germanium Ge-132 with 5ppm,8ppm and 10ppm were added into blend biodiesel B20 to investigate the effect of the additive to the biodiesel blends. The blended fuels were experimentally tested with YANMAR TF120M diesel engine at engine loads of 25%, 50%, 75% and 100% at a constant 1800 rpm engine speed. The addition of Ge-132 causing no significant negative effect on physicochemical properties. The result performance reveals the brake fuel consumption improve by 1.22%,2.38% and 3.09% for B20Ge5, B20Ge8 and B20Ge10 compared to B20. Compare to B20, the percentage different of B20 with Ge-132 improve about 0.41%-6.17% and 0.51%-8.89% for brake thermal efficiency and exhaust gas temperature, respectively. The analysis of additive Ge-132 in biodiesel blends show the potential to be further researched as an additive due to significant improvement in performance characteristics.

This paper provides a critical review of the feasibility to construct smart structures using pseudoelastic and pseudoplastic shape memory alloy for rehabilitation, seismic resistant, retrofit or repair of structural elements and prestress application. Recent developments have been rapid, making the SMA promising a viable solution for numerous situations in buildings and infrastructure. Owing to their distinctive properties including pseudoelastic, pseudoplastic, hysteretic damping due their ability to undergo large deformations and return to their undeformed shape through stress removal (pseudoelastic) or heating (pseudoplastict) and the superior energy dissipation capacity which led to the use of shape-memory alloys to mitigate natural disasters, repair of structural elements, prestress application to enhance structural performance and safety are reviewed, discussed and explains in different alternatives for its application, which should motivate researchers and practicing engineers to extend its use in novel and emerging applications This paper also examines the fundamental characteristics of SMAs, its constitutive material models and the factors influencing its engineering properties. Also stated is the contrast between reinforcement material properties of steel and SMAs and the type of SMA used by the previous researchers. A review of current studies show that the pseudoelastic SMA, pseudoplastic and high-damping characteristics of SMAs result in applications in bridges and buildings that show significant promise.

Laser engraving process is non-conventional machining process used for engraving of almost each material which cannot be mark by conventional machining processes. Laser engraving process is done by heat up mechanism which vaporize the material surface. With the use of laser engraving machine the engraving is possible by utilizing different input parameter as spot diameter, laser power, laser frequency, different wave length, engraving speed, number of passes etc. Output parameter is potentially material removal rate, surface finish and indentation. Parameters with multiple responses characteristic is optimized based on the Taguchi method analysis. Three input parameter (frequency, engraving speed and number of passes) were investigated its effect on surface roughness as it output parameter.