Seven adjustments of convergent-type Vortex Tube (VT) with different throttle angles were applied. The adjustments were made to analyze the influences of such angles on cold and hot temperature drops as well as flow structures inside the VTs. An experimental setup was designed, and tests were performed on different convergent VT configurations at injection pressures ranging from 0.45 to 0.65 MPa. The angles of the throttle valve were arranged between 30° to 90°, and the numbers of injection nozzles ranged between 2 and 6. Laboratory results indicated that the maximum hot and cold temperature drops ranged from 23.24 to 35 K and from 22.87 to 32.88 K, respectively, at four injection nozzles. Results also showed that temperature drop is a function of hot throttle valve angle with the maximum hot and cold temperature drops depending on the angle applied. We used graphs to demonstrate the changes in the cold and hot temperature drops with respect to hot throttle angle values. These values were interpreted and evaluated to determine the optimum angle, which was 60°. The CFD outputs agreed very well with the laboratory results. The proposed CFD results can help future researchers gain good insights into the complicated separation process taking place inside the VTs.

Air separators provide safe, clean, and appropriate air flow to engines and are widely used in vehicles with large engines such as ships and submarines. In this operational study, the separation process in a Ranque–Hilsch vortex tube cleaning (cooling) system is investigated to analyze the impact of the operating gas type on the vortex tube performance; the operating gases used are air, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide and nitrogen dioxide. The computational fluid dynamic model used is equipped with a three-dimensional structure, and the steady-state condition is applied during computations. The standard k–ε turbulence model is employed to resolve nonlinear flow equations, and various key parameters, such as hot and cold exhaust thermal drops, and power separation rates, are described numerically. The results show that nitrogen dioxide creates the greatest separation power out of all gases tested, and the numerical results are validated by good agreement with available experimental data. In addition, a comparison is made between the use of two different boundary conditions, the pressure-far-field and the pressure-outlet, when analyzing complex turbulent flows in the air separators. Results present a comprehensive and practical solution for use in future numerical studies.

Fishing is a major local industry in Malaysia, particularly in rural areas. However, the rapidly increasing price of fuel is seriously affecting the industry’s viability. At present, outboard petrol engines are the preferred choice for use in small-scale fishing boats because they deliver the advantages of high speed and low weight, they are easy to install, and they use minimal space. Petrol outboard engines are known to consume a greater amount of fuel than inboard diesel engines, but installing diesel engines with conventional submerged propellers in existing small-scale fishing boats is not economically viable because major hullform modifications and extra expenditure are required to achieve this. This study describes a proposal to enable reductions in fuel consumption by introducing the combined use of a diesel engine and Surface-Piercing Propeller (SPP). An analysis of fuel consumption reduction is presented, together with an economic feasibility study. Resulting data reveal that the use of the proposed modifications would save 23.31 liters of fuel per trip (40.75%) compared to outboard motors, equaling annual savings of RM 3962 per year.

The present paper investigated and analyzed swirler material consisting of mild steel which was subjected to service for the period of one year in a 30 MW marine boiler.Due to the presence of high temperatures in the furnace coupled with the corrosive marine environment swirler material showed accelerated degradation and material wastage.An investigation into the feasibility of manufacturing the existing swirler with an alternate material or coating the swirler material with a thermal barrier coating was undertaken.Based on their properties and performance, SS 304 and SS 316 were proposed as the replacement materials for the swirler.The other alternative of coating the existing swirlers with a form thermal barrier coating to observe for any improvement in their performance at elevated temperatures was also tested. Stellite, which is a Ni-Co based coating, was carried out on the MS samples and the same were exposed to same temperatures mentioned above.The performance of the available options was evaluated with respect to the grain structure of the material, the hardness value of the materials and deterioration at elevated temperatures.Investigation showed the proposed materials/coatings like SS 304, SS 316 and Stellite coating revealed that SS 316 is the material best suited for high temperature application.

This paper presents a simulator model of a marine diesel engine based on physical, semi-physical, mathematical and thermodynamic equations, which allows fast predictive simulations. The whole engine system is divided into several functional blocks: cooling, lubrication, air, injection, combustion and emissions. The sub-models and dynamic characteristics of individual blocks are established according to engine working principles equations and experimental data collected from a marine diesel engine test bench for SIMB Company under the reference 6M26SRP1. The overall engine system dynamics is expressed as a set of simultaneous algebraic and differential equations using sub-blocks and S-Functions of Matlab/Simulink. The simulation of this model, implemented on Matlab/Simulink has been validated and can be used to obtain engine performance, pressure, temperature, efficiency, heat release, crank angle, fuel rate, emissions at different sub-blocks. The simulator will be used, in future work, to study the engine performance in faulty conditions, and can be used to assist marine engineers in fault diagnosis and estimation (FDI) as well as designers to predict the behavior of the cooling system, lubrication system, injection system, combustion, emissions, in order to optimize the dimensions of different components. This program is a platform for fault simulator, to investigate the impact on sub-blocks engine’s output of changing values for faults parameters such as: faulty fuel injector, leaky cylinder, worn fuel pump, broken piston rings, a dirty turbocharger, dirty air filter, dirty air cooler, air leakage, water leakage, oil leakage and contamination, fouling of heat exchanger, pumps wear, failure of injectors (and many others).

The high-speed digital imaging technique is applied to observe the developing process of flash boiling spray of dimethyl ether at low ambient pressure, and the effects of nozzle opening pressure and nozzle hole diameter on the spray shape, spray tip penetration and spray angle during the injection are investigated. The experimental results show that the time when the vortex ring structure of flash boiling spray forms and its developing process are determined by the combined action of the bubble growth and breakup in the spray and the air drag on the leading end of spray; with the enhancement of nozzle opening pressure, the spray tip penetration increases and the spray angle decreases. The influence of nozzle hole diameter on the spray tip penetration is relatively complicated, the spray tip penetration is longer with a smaller nozzle hole diameter at the early stage of injection, while the situation is just opposite at the later stage of injection. This paper establishes that the variation of spray angle is consistent with that of nozzle hole diameter.

Heat transfer enhancement is used in many applications including heat exchangers, air conditioning, and refrigeration systems; hence many researchers have conducted experimental and numerical researches on heat transfer enhancement and have developed various techniques and methods. As a passive heat transfer technique, twisted tapes are widely used in various industries for their cost savings, lower maintenance requirements and the fact that they are easily set up. This paper introduces the principle of heat transfer enhancement of twisted tapes and reviews some of the experimental works done by researchers on this technique in recent years. The variously modified twisted tape inserts are widely researched and used to enhance heat transfer efficiency for heat exchangers. Twisted tapes perform better in low Re conditions and in square tubes. However, they could also cause higher pressure drops. Twisted tapes have great potential and profound implications if they can be used in traditional heat exchangers. Besides this, some correlations between the Nusselt number and friction factors are presented in this paper.

Motivated by the need for improving the isolation performance, many research studies have been performed on isolators with nonlinear characteristics. Based on the shape of their phase portrait, such devices can be configured as either a mono- or bi-stable isolator. This paper focuses on investigating the relative performance of these two classes under the same excitations. Force transmissibility is used to measure the isolation performance, which is defined in terms of the RMS of the ratio of the transmitted force to the excitation force. When the system is subjected to harmonic excitation, it is found that the maximum reduction of the force transmissibility in the isolation range using Quasi-Zero stiffness is achieved. When the system is subjected to random excitation, it has the same effect of Quasi-Zero stiffness. Further, optimum damping can be changed with stiffness and has minimum value.

Escalating apprehension about the harmful effects of widespread use of conventional fossil fuels in the marine field and in internal combustion engines in general, has led to a vast amount of efforts and the directing of large capital investment towards research and development of sustainable alternative energy sources. One of the most promising and abundant of these sources is hydrogen. Firstly, the use of current fossil fuels is discussed focusing on the emissions and economic sides to emphasize the need for a new, cleaner and renewable fuel with particular reference to hydrogen as a suitable possible alternative. Hydrogen properties, production and storage methods are then reviewed along with its suitability from the economical point of view. Finally, a cost analysis for the use of hydrogen in internal combustion engines is carried out to illustrate the benefits of its use as a replacement for diesel. The outcome of this cost analysis shows that 98% of the capital expenditure is consumed by the equipment, and 68.3% of the total cost of the equipment is spent on the solar photovoltaic cells. The hydrogen plant is classified as a large investment project because of its high initial cost which is about 1 billion US$; but this is justified because hydrogen is produced in a totally green way. When hydrogen is used as a fuel, no harmful emissions are obtained.

Several industrial applications such as electronic devices, heat exchangers, gas turbine blades, etc. need cooling processes. The internal cooling technique is proper for some applications. In the present work, computational simulations were made using ANSYS CFX to predict the improvements of internal heat transfer in the rectangular ribbed channel using different coolants. Several coolants such as air, steam, air/mist and steam/mist were investigated. The shear stress transport model (SST) is selected by comparing the standard k-ω and Omega Reynolds Stress (ωRS) turbulence models with experimental results.The results indicate that the heat transfer coefficients are enhanced in the ribbed channel while injecting small amounts of mist. The heat transfer coefficients of air/mist, steam and steam/mist increase by 12.5%, 49.5% and 107% over that of air, respectively. Furthermore, in comparison to air, the air/mist heat transfer coefficient enhances by about 1.05 to 1.14 times when the mist mass fraction increases from 2% to 8%, respectively. The steam/mist heat transfer coefficient increases by about 1.12 to 1.27 times higher than that of steam over the considered range of mist mass fraction.

Strong restrictions on emissions from marine power plants (particularly SOx, NOx) will probably be adopted in the near future. In this paper, a combined solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) and steam turbine fuelled by natural gas is proposed as an attractive option to limit the environmental impact of the marine sector. The analyzed variant of the combined cycle includes a SOFC operated with natural gas fuel and a steam turbine with a single-pressure waste heat boiler. The calculations were performed for two types of tubular and planar SOFCs, each with an output power of 18 MW. This paper includes a detailed energy analysis of the combined system. Mass and energy balances are performed not only for the whole plant but also for each component in order to evaluate the thermal efficiency of the combined cycle. In addition, the effects of using natural gas as a fuel on the fuel cell voltage and performance are investigated. It has been found that a high overall efficiency approaching 60% may be achieved with an optimum configuration using the SOFC system. The hybrid system would also reduce emissions, fuel consumption, and improve the total system efficiency.

The noise induced by the fluctuant saturated steam flow under 250 °C in a stop-valve was numerically studied. The simulation was carried out using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and ACTRAN. The acoustic field was investigated with Lighthill’s acoustic analogy based on the properties of the flow field obtained using a large-eddy simulation that employs the LES-WALE dynamic model as the sub-grid-scale model. Firstly, the validation of mesh was well conducted, illustrating that two million elements were sufficient in this situation. Secondly, the treatment of the steam was deliberated, and conclusions indicate that when predicting the flow-induced noise of the stop-valve, the steam can be treated as incompressible gas at a low inlet velocity. Thirdly, the flow-induced noises under different inlet velocities were compared. The findings reveal it has remarkable influence on the flow-induced noises. Lastly, whether or not the heat preservation of the wall has influence on the noise was taken into account. The results show that heat preservation of the wall had little influence.

A simulation model of an electronically controlled two solenoid valve fuel injection system for a diesel engine is established in the AMESim environment. The accuracy of the model is validated through comparison with experimental data. The influence of pre-injection control parameters on main-injection quantity under different control modes is analyzed. In the spill control valve mode, main-injection fuel quantity decreases gradually and then reaches a stable level because of the increase in multi-injection dwell time. In the needle control valve mode, main-injection fuel quantity increases with rising multi-injection dwell time; this effect becomes more obvious at high-speed revolutions and large main-injection pulse widths. Pre-injection pulse width has no obvious influence on main-injection quantity under the two control modes; the variation in main-injection quantity is in the range of 1 mm3.

This paper mainly studies on the performance of high-speed diesel engines and emission reduction when the engine uses heavy oil mixed with nanometer-sized additives Ce0.9Cu0.1O2 and Ce0.9Zr0.1O2. During the test, Indiset 620 combustion analyzer made by AVL, was used to make a real-time survey on the cylinder pressure, the fuel ignition moment, and establish a relation between the change trend of temperature in cylinder and the crank angle. For the engine burning heavy oil and heavy oil mixed with additives, combustion analysis software Indicom and Concerto were used to analyze its combustion process and emission conditions. Experimental investigation shows that nano-sized complex oxide can improve the performance of diesel engine fueled with heavy oil, and reduce the emission of pollutants like NOx and CO, comparing it with the pure heavy oil. According to the consequences of this experiment, the additives improve the overall performance in the use of heavy oil.

In the present work, computational simulations was made using ANSYS CFX to predict the improvements in film cooling performance with dual trench. Dual-trench configuration consists of two trenches together, one wider trench and the other is narrow trench that extruded from the wider one. Several blowing ratios in the range (0.5:5) were investigated. The pitch-to-diameter ratio of 2.775 is used. By using the dual trench configuration, the coolant jet impacted the trench wall two times allowing increasing the spreading of coolant laterally in the trench, reducing jet velocity and jet completely covered on the surface. The results indicate that this configuration increased adiabatic effectiveness as blowing ratio increased. The spatially averaged adiabatic effectiveness reached 57.6% for at M= 2. No observed film blow-off at all blowing ratios. The adiabatic film effectiveness of dual trench case outperformed the narrow trench case, laidback fan-shaped hole, fan-shaped hole and cylinder hole at different blowing ratios.

In efforts to overcome an foreseeable energy crisis predicated on limited oil and gas supplies, reserves; economic variations facing the world, and of course the environmental side effects of fossil fuels, an urgent need for energy sources that provide sustainable, safe and economic supplies for the world is imperative. The current fossil fuel energy system must be improved to ensure a better and cleaner transportation future for the world. Despite the fact that the marine transportation sector consumes only 5% of global petroleum production; it is responsible for 15% of the world NOx and SOx emissions. These figures must be the engine that powers the scientific research worldwide to develop new solutions for a very old energy problem. In this paper, the most effective types of marine power plants were discussed. The history of the development of each type was presented first and the technical aspects were discussed second. Also, the fuel cells as a new type of power plants used in marine sector were briefed to give a complete overview of the past, present and future of the marine power plants development. Based on the increased worldwide concerns regarding harmful emissions, many researchers have introduced solutions to this problem, including the adoption of new cleaner fuels. This paper was guided using the same trend and by implementing the hydrogen as fuel for marine internal combustion engine, gas turbines, and fuel cells.

A novel flywheel energy storage (FES) motor/generator (M/G) was proposed for marine systems. The purpose was to improve the power quality of a marine power system (MPS) and strengthen the energy recycle. Two structures including the magnetic or non-magnetic inner-rotor were contrasted in the magnetostatic field by using finite element analysis (FEA). By optimally designing the size parameters, the average speed of FEA results of was 17 200 r/m, and the current was controlled between 62 and 68 A in the transient field. The electrical machine electromagnetism design was further optimized by the FEA in the temperature field, to find the local overheating point under the normal operation condition and provide guidance for the cooling system. Finally, it can be concluded from the comprehensive physical field analysis that the novel redundant structure M/G can improve the efficiency of the M/G and maintain the stability of the MPS.

An experimental program was undertaken to test the feasibility to detect the occurrence of structural damage using a modified mode shape difference technique. The vibration response of a steel beam fixed at one end and hinged at the other was obtained for the intact and damage conditions. Modal analysis was performed to extract the frequencies and mode shapes. The method shows a good potential in detection of occurrence and location of damage.

Propulsion of liquefied natural gas (LNG) ships is undergoing significant change. The traditional steam plant is losing favor because of its low cycle efficiency. Medium-speed diesel-electric and slow-speed diesel-mechanical drive ships are in service, and more are being built. Another attractive alternative is combined gas and steam turbine (COGAS) drive. This approach offers significant advantages over steam and diesel propulsion. This paper presents the case for the COGAS cycle.

The present investigation deals with process analysis of oxy-acetylene flame assisted double pass line heating for varying plate thickness. oxy-acetylene flame as the heat source for multi pass line heating to achieve 3-D bending of plates with varying thicknesses was studied. The oxy-acetylene flame was modeled as the moving heat source in the FEM analysis. The transient thermal histories were predicted taking into account the temperature dependent thermo-mechanical properties. A comparative study between single pass and double pass line heating residual deformation was also carried out. The temperature distribution and residual deformations predicted by the numerical model developed in the present work compared fairly well with those of the experimental ones.

An analytical study was presented on active control of sound transmission into a vibro-acoustic enclosure comprising two flexible plates. Two types of actuators were used, i.e. acoustic actuator and distributed lead zirconate titanate piezoelectric (PZT) actuator instead of point force actuator. Using the modal acoustic transfer impedance-mobility matrices, the excitation and interaction in the coupled sound transmission system can be described with clear physical significance. With the control system designed to globally reduce the sound field, different control system configurations were considered, including the structural actuator on the incident plate, actuator on the receiving plate, acoustic actuator on the cavity, and their combinations. The effectiveness and performance of the control strategy corresponding to each system configuration were compared and discussed. The role and control mechanism of each type of actuator were of particular interest. It was shown that the incident plate actuator is effective in controlling the cavity-dominated modes and the structural modes dominated by the incident plate and receiving plate. Two main control mechanisms are involved in this control configuration, i.e., modal suppressing and modal rearrangement. For control system configuration with only acoustic actuator in the enclosure, the mechanism involved in this arrangement is purely modal suppression. Desirable placements of structural actuators in terms of total potential energy reduction were also discussed.

A marine propulsion system is a very complicated system composed of many mechanical components. As a result, the vibration signal of a gearbox in the system is strongly coupled with the vibration signatures of other components including a diesel engine and main shaft. It is therefore imperative to assess the coupling effect on diagnostic reliability in the process of gear fault diagnosis. For this reason, a fault detection and diagnosis method based on bispectrum analysis and artificial neural networks (ANNs) was proposed for the gearbox with consideration given to the impact of the other components in marine propulsion systems. To monitor the gear conditions, the bispectrum analysis was first employed to detect gear faults. The amplitude-frequency plots containing gear characteristic signals were then attained based on the bispectrum technique, which could be regarded as an index actualizing forepart gear faults diagnosis. Both the back propagation neural network (BPNN) and the radial-basis function neural network (RBFNN) were applied to identify the states of the gearbox. The numeric and experimental test results show the bispectral patterns of varying gear fault severities are different so that distinct fault features of the vibrant signal of a marine gearbox can be extracted effectively using the bispectrum, and the ANN classification method has achieved high detection accuracy. Hence, the proposed diagnostic techniques have the capability of diagnosing marine gear faults in the earlier phases, and thus have application importance.

Rigid blocking masses are located in the typical base structure of a power cabin based on the impedance mismatch principle. By combining the acoustic-structural coupling method and statistical energy analysis, the full-band vibration and sound radiation reduction effect of vibration isolation masses located in a base structure was researched. The influence of the blocking mass’ cross-section size and shape parameters and the layout location of the base isolation performance was discussed. Furthermore, the effectiveness of rigid vibration isolation design of the base structure was validated. The results show that the medium and high frequency vibration and sound radiation of a power cabin are effectively reduced by a blocking mass. Concerning weight increment and section requirement, suitably increasing the blocking mass size and section height and reducing section width can result in an efficiency-cost ratio.

In order to study the effects of wet compression on a transonic compressor, a full 3-D steady numerical simulation was carried out under varying conditions. Different injected water flow rates and droplet diameters were considered. The effect of wet compression on the shock, separated flow, pressure ratio, and efficiency was investigated. Additionally, the effect of wet compression on the tip clearance when the compressor runs in the near-stall and stall situations was emphasized. Analysis of the results shows that the range of stable operation is extended, and that the pressure ratio and inlet air flow rate are also increased at the near-stall point. In addition, it seems that there is an optimum size of the droplet diameter.

Based on the principle of impedance mismatching, the performance of rigid vibration isolation mass in impeding vibration wave propagation was discussed from the perspective of wave approach. Based on FEM, the influence of its weight as well as the cross-section shape parameters on the isolation performance of rigid vibration isolation mass was studied through numerical simulation. The results show that rigid vibration isolation mass can effectively impede the propagation of the medium and high frequency vibration waves, and the heavier the vibration isolation mass, the better the isolation performance. For low frequency waves, the vibration isolation effect is not so obvious; for a rectangular vibration isolation mass, the isolation performance could be effectively improved by increasing the cross-section height and reducing the cross-section width. A useful reference was provided for the application of rigid vibration isolation masses to the vibration isolation and noise reduction of ship structure.

A numerical and experimental study was presented on active control of structurally radiated sound from an elastic cylindrical shell. An analytical model was developed for the active structural acoustic control (ASAC) of the cylindrical shell. Both global and local control strategies were considered. The optimal control forces corresponding to each control strategy were obtained by using the linear quadratic optimal control theory. Numerical simulations were performed to examine and analyze the control performance under different control strategies. The results show that global sound attenuation of the cylindrical shell at resonance frequencies can be achieved by using point force as the control input of the ASAC system. Better control performance can be obtained under the control strategy of minimization of the radiated sound power. However, control spillover may occur at off-resonance frequencies with the control strategy of structural kinetic energy minimization in terms of the radiated sound power. Considerable levels of global sound attenuation can also be achieved in the on-resonance cases with the local control strategy, i.e., minimization of the mean-square velocity of finite discrete locations. An ASAC experiment using an FXLMS algorithm was implemented, agreement was observed between the numerical and experimental results, and successful attenuation of structural vibration and radiated sound was achieved.

This paper presents an analytical study on the influence of edge restraining stiffness on the transverse vibrations of rectangular plate structure. An improved Fourier series method was employed to analyze the transverse vibration of plate structure with general elastically restrained boundary conditions. A linear combination of a double Fourier series and eight auxiliary terms was sought as the admissible function of the flexural displacement of the plate, each term being a combination of a polynomial function and a single cosine series expansion. The auxiliary terms were introduced to ensure and improve the smoothness of the original displacement function and its derivatives at the boundaries. Several numerical examples were given to demonstrate the validity and accuracy of the current solution. The influences of translational and rotational stiffness on the natural frequencies and mode shapes of plate were analyzed by numerical results. The results show that the translational stiffness has bigger influence on the natural frequencies than the rotational stiffness. It is generally well known that little change of the rotational stiffness has little influence on the mode shapes of plate. However, the current work shows that a very little change of rotational stiffness value may lead to a large change of the mode shapes of a square plate structure.

Hydraulic butterfly valves have been widely applied in marine engineering because of their large switching torque, low pressure loss and suitability for large and medium diameter pipelines. Due to control problems resulting from switching angular speeds of the hydraulic butterfly valve, a throttle-governing control mode has been widely adopted, and detailed analysis has been carried out worldwide on the structural principle concerning speed-regulation and the load torque on the shaft while opening or closing a hydraulic butterfly valve. However relevant reports have yet been published on the change law, the error and the influencing factors of the rotational angular velocity of the hydraulic butterfly valve while opening and closing. In this article, research was based on some common specifications of a hydraulic butterfly valve with a symmetrical valve flap existing in a marine environment. The throttle governing system supplied by the accumulator to achieve the switching of the hydraulic control valve was adopted, and the mathematical models of the system were established in the actual conditions while the numerical simulations took place. The simulation results and analysis show that the rotational angular velocity and the error of the hydraulic butterfly valve while switching is influenced greatly by the drainage amount of the accumulator, resulting in pressure loss in the pipeline, the temperature of hydraulic medium and the load of the hydraulic butterfly valve. The simulation results and analysis provide a theoretical basis for the choice of the total capacity of the accumulator and pipeline diameters in a throttle governing system with a hydraulic butterfly valve.It also determines the type and specification of the hydraulic butterfly valve and the design of motion parameters of the transported fluid.

The electronic in-line pump (EIP) is a complex system consisting of mechanical, hydraulic, and electromagnetic parts. Experimental study showed that the fuel pressure of the plunger and the fuel drainage of the pressure system after fuel injection could result in fuel pressure fluctuation in the low pressure system. Such fluctuation exhibited pulsating cycle fluctuation as the amplitude rose with the increase of the injection pulse width. The time domain analysis found that the pressure time history curve and injection cylinders corresponded with a one-to-one relationship. By frequency domain analysis, the result was that with the increase of the working cylinder number, the high frequency amplitude gradually increased and the basic frequency amplitude gradually decreased. The conclusion was that through wavelet transformation, the low pressure signal simultaneously moved towards low frequency as the high frequency of the wavelet transformation signal with the working cylinder number increased. Lastly, by using the numerical model, the study investigated the simulation research concerning the relationship of the fluctuation dynamic characteristic in the low pressure system and the fuel injection characteristic of the high pressure system, completing the conclusions obtained by the experimental study.

Solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) has been identified as an effective and clean alternative choice for marine power system. This paper emphasizes on the dynamic modeling of SOFC power system and its performance based upon marine operating circumstance. A SOFC power system model has been provided considering thermodynamic and electrochemical reaction mechanism. Subcomponents of lithium ion battery, power conditioning unit, stack structure and controller are integrated in the model. The dynamic response of the system is identified according to the inertia of its subcomponent and controller. Validation of the whole system simulation at steady state and transit period are presented, concerning the effects of thermo inertia, control strategy and seagoing environment. The simulation results show reasonable accuracy compare with lab test. The models can be used to predict performance of a SOFC power system and identify the system response when part of the component parameter is adjusted.

It can be beneficial to reduce vibrations in shipboard piping, so the authors designed a new kind of piping damper with a plunger-type accumulator. Special requirements for the piping damper included low impact displacement, low speed, as well as an appropriate locking speed. Inside the damper, a plunger-type accumulator was installed and on the outside of the piston rod, a tube with exposed corrugations was added. Between the piston and the cylinder, a clearance seal was added. Using mathematical modeling, the effects of the dynamic performance of the damper’s impact displacement on vibrations were observed. Changes to the clearance between the piston and the cylinder, the stiffness of the spring in the accumulator, the throttle valve size, and locking speed resistance of the damper were respectively simulated and studied. Based on the results of the simulation, dampers with optimal parameters were developed and tested with different accumulator spring stiffnesses and different throttles. The simulation and experimental results showed that parameters such as seal clearance between piston and cylinder, accumulator spring stiffness and throttle parameters have significant effects on the damper’s impact displacement, low speed resistance and locking speed.

S surface controllers have been proven to provide effective motion control for an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV). However, it is difficult to adjust their control parameters manually. Choosing the optimum parameters for the controller of a particular AUV is a significant challenge. To automate the process, a modified particle swarm optimization (MPSO) algorithm was proposed. It was based on immune theory, and used a nonlinear regression strategy for inertia weight to optimize AUV control parameters. A semi-physical simulation system for the AUV was developed as a platform to verify the proposed control method, and its structure was considered. The simulation results indicated that the semi-physical simulation platform was helpful, the optimization algorithm has good local and global searching abilities, and the method can be reliably used for an AUV.

Reconfigurability of the electrical network in a shipboard power system (SPS) after its failure is central to the restoration of power supply and improves survivability of an SPS. The navigational process creates a sequence of different operating conditions. The priority of some loads differs in changing operating conditions. After analyzing characteristics of typical SPS, a model was developed used a grade Ⅲ switchboard and an environmental prioritizing agent (EPA) algorithm. This algorithm was chosen as it is logically and physically decentralized as well as multi-agent oriented. The EPA algorithm was used to decide on the dynamic load priority, then it selected the means to best meet the maximum power supply load. The simulation results showed that higher priority loads were the first to be restored. The system satisfied all necessary constraints, demonstrating the effectiveness and validity of the proposed method.

The effect of hydrostatic pressure on the vibration dispersion characteristics of fluid-shell coupled structures was studied. Both fluid-loaded cylindrical shells and fluid-filled cylindrical shells were considered. Numerical analysis was applied to solve the dispersion equations for shells filled with or loaded with fluid at various hydrostatic pressures. The results for external pressure showed that non-dimensional axial wave numbers are nearly independent when the pressure is below the critical level. The influence of internal pressure on wave numbers was found significant for the real branch s=1 and the complex branches of dispersion curves. The presence of internal pressure increased the cut on frequencies for the branch s=1 for high order wave modes.

To reduce vibration and noise and increase transmission efficiency, a three segment method for modifying the pinion profile was proposed. Cutter surface equations were deduced by changing the shape of the cutter-edge, substituting three segment parabolas for the line. The influence of longitudinal tooth modifications on tooth surface load distributions was discussed. Transmission error minimization and uniformity of tooth surface load distribution were chosen as optimization goals and the modified parameters were obtained by applying the complex method. Finally, an experiment comparing the loaded transmission error, vibration, and noise both before and after modifications was carried out. The results indicate that the modified design is reliable.

The accuracy of parameter estimation is critical when digitally modeling a ship. A parameter estimation method with constraints was developed, based on the variational method. Performance functions and constraint equations in the variational method are constructed by analyzing input and output equations of the system. The problem of parameter estimation was transformed into a problem of least squares estimation. The parameter estimation equation was analyzed in order to get an optimized estimation of parameters based on the Lagrange multiplication operator. Simulation results showed that this method is better than the traditional least squares estimation, producing a higher precision when identifying parameters. It has very important practical value in areas of application such as system identification and parameter estimation.

WIT Electronic Fuel System Co.,Ltd. has developed a new fuel injector,the Electronic In-line Pump (EIP) system,designed to meet China’s diesel engine emission and fuel economy regulations. It can be used on marine diesel engines and commercial vehicle engines through different EIP systems. A numerical model of the EIP system was built in the AMESim environment for the purpose of creating a design tool for engine application and system optimization. The model was used to predict key injection characteristics under different operating conditions,such as injection pressure,injection rate,and injection duration. To validate these predictions,experimental tests were conducted under the conditions that were modeled. The results were quite encouraging and in agreement with model predictions. Additional experiments were conducted to study the injection characteristics of the EIP system. These results show that injection pressure and injection quantity are insensitive to injection timing variations,this is due to the design of the constant velocity cam profile. Finally,injection quantity and pressure vs. pulse width at different cam speeds are presented,an important injection characteristic for EIP system calibration.

Parallel turbine-driven feedwater pumps are needed when ships travel at high speed. In order to study marine steam generator feedwater control systems which use parallel turbine-driven feed pumps,a mathematical model of marine steam generator feedwater control system was developed which includes mathematical models of two steam generators and parallel turbine-driven feed pumps as well as mathematical models of feedwater pipes and feed regulating valves. The operating condition points of the parallel turbine-driven feed pumps were calculated by the Chebyshev curve fit method. A water level controller for the steam generator and a rotary speed controller for the turbine-driven feed pumps were also included in the model. The accuracy of the mathematical models and their controllers was verified by comparing their results with those from a simulator.

In marine engine exhaust silencing systems,the presence of exhaust gas flow influences the sound propagation inside the systems and the acoustic attenuation performance of silencers.In order to investigate the effects of three-dimensional gas flow and acoustic damping on the acoustic attenuation characteristics of marine engine exhaust silencers,a dual reciprocity boundary element method (DRBEM)was developed.The acoustic governing equation in three-dimensional potential flow was derived first,and then the DRBEM numerical procedure is given.Compared to the conventional boundary elementmethod (CBEM),the DRBEM considers the second order terms of flow Mach number in the acoustic governing equation,so it is suitable for the cases with higher Mach number subsonic flow.For complex exhaust silencers,it is difficult to apply the single-domain boundary element method,so a substructure approach based on the dual reciprocity boundary element method is presented.The experiments for measuring transmission loss of silencers are conducted,and the experimental setup and measurements are explained.The transmission loss of a single expansion chamber silencer with extended inlet and outlet were predicted by DRBEM and compared with the measurements.The good agreements between predictions and measurements are observed,which demonstrated that the derived acoustic governing equation and the DRBEM numerical procedure in the present study are correct.

In order to improve performance of the DA465Q gasoline engine,a substantial amount of research was done to optimize its turbocharging system.The research led to the GT12 turbocharger being selected and its turbocharging parameters being settled.Based on these tests,rational matching was worked out for respective components of the turbocharging system.Results show that this turbocharger allows the engine to easily meet the proposed requirements for power and economic performance,giving insight into further performance improvements for gasoline engines.