Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Mechanical'

The mechanical pulping industry has been developing throughout the years, due to competitive prices in the electricity market and good accessibility of wood. This has made it possible for such and “expensive” process to further develop. Today, with increasing electricity prizes, it is of great interest to reduce electrical consumption in mechanical pulping industry, since the process consumes large amounts of electricity. Braviken paper mill is starting up a new thermomechanical pulping line, scheduled for start-up in August 2008, which aims to reduce electrical consumption. The new line will include chip pre-treatment equipment such as an impregnator, an Andrtiz Impressafiner (Screw press), a high intensity primary stage refines double disc (DD), and a new low consistency refiner (LC), significantly bigger than those earlier available on the market. This master´s thesis is one out of three Master´s thesis made at Braviken paper mill during spring 2008. They all are connected, and are investigating the possibility to reduce electric energy consumption within TMP production. Master´s thesis concerning high consistency refining was done by Dino Muhic, “High consistency refining of mechanical pulps during varying refining conditions”, and low consistency refining written by Fredrik Johansson “Increased energy efficiency in low consistency refining”.

Chip pre-treatment is to be used to reduce electrical consumption. Mechanical pre-treatment, such as using an Andrtiz Impressafiner demolishes the chips while also making it possible to impregnate the chips with chemicals, the later giving additional possibilities to reduce electricity consumption. Chemical chip pre-treatment decreases the lignin softening temperature, which benefits the refining process, yielding longer and less damaged fibers that will create a fibrous pulp with reduced electrical energy input.The goal for this study was to investigate the effect of alkaline-peroxide on chip pre-treatment by using a design of experiment method, in terms of electric energy consumption for the process, strength properties, opacity and ISO-brightness within the pulp/sheets. The trials were built up as a factorial experiment, with two factors, alkaline and peroxide, with two levels each (high and low). The high level for alkaline was 15 kg/t and 10 kg/t for the low level, and the high level for peroxide was 10 kg/t and 5 kg/t for the low level. This resulted in four trials with two zero-points, and two reference pulps, one normal TMP, thermomechanical pulp, and the other TMP with pressafiner and water.

The trials showed that adding alkaline-peroxide clearly had an impact on pulp properties, such as increased strength properties, fiber length improvements and less shives could be found in the alkaline-peroxide treated pulps. The yield was highest for the normal TMP, about 99% and it decreased with increasing alkaline addition, the lowest value was achieved for the pulps containing the highest dose of alkaline, about 95%. The optical properties were more or less as expected. Opacity had the highest value for the pulps that had been made from chips with the highest total alkaline level. The ISO brightness was highest for pulps containing low level of alkaline. It could not be decided if the electricity demand had been reduced for the chemically treated pulps; it actually had the opposite effect as expected. The chemically treated pulps demanded a higher SEC, specific energy consumption, compared to the reference pulps. This result could have depended on the small pilot plant high consistency refiners at CTP, Centre technique du papier, Grenoble, France, due to the plate size and what kind of plats that were used. To do trials like this and to be able to draw correct conclusions relevant for a full scale plant, bigger refiners might give a more comparable result. It was clear that the fiber properties had improved, which could be the key to reduce electricity when LE- (low-energy) plates are used in the HC-refiner. A higher intensity could be used and electricity energy could be saved.

Statement of the problem: The systematic implementation of evidence-based practice through the use of guidelines, checklists and protocols has been shown to mitigate the risks associated with MV, yet variation in practice remains prevalent. Recent advances in MV, physiologic monitoring, device-to-device communication, computer processing and software engineering have allowed for the development of an automated point-of-care access to real-time goal setting and practice variance identification. Our aim was to assess the utility of a computer-aided MV (CAMV) system that displays variances and scores the overall MV course. Methods: A retrospective categorization of the ventilation and oxygenation statuses of patients within our pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) over a 2 '/z years period utilizing 15 rule-based algorithms was initiated as a proof of concept. Goals were predetermined based on generally accepted values. All patient categories were calculated and presented as a percent of recording time. Following the feasibility study, a retrospective observational study (baseline), followed by two sequential interventions made over a 2-month period was conducted. Phase I comprised a survey of goals of MV by clinicians caring for patients being monitored by the CAMV system. Phase II intervention was the setting and monitoring of goals of MV with a web browser based data visualization system (T3). An outcome measurement tool was developed to score each MV course. The MV score (MVS) evaluated four outcomes: (1) acceptable ventilation, (2) acceptable oxygenation, (3) barotrauma free and (4) volutrauma-free states as a percent of recording time. Results: Pilot consisted of 222 patients. The Baseline phase evaluated 130 patients, Phase I enrolled 31 patients and Phase II enrolled 36 patients. There were no differences in demographic characteristics between cohorts. One hundred and seventy-one surveys were completed in Phase I. An increase in the use of T3 by 87% was observed in Phase II from Phase I. MVS improved by 8.4% in Phase I and 11.3% in Phase II from Baseline. The largest improvement was in the volutraumafree category. MVS was 9% higher on average in those who survived. Conclusion: The use of CAMV was associated with an improvement in MVS. Further research is needed to determine if improvements in MVS through a targeted, process-oriented intervention such as CAMV will lead to improved patient outcomes.

A common technique to improve the performance of shell and tube heat exchangers (STHE) is by redirecting the flow in the shell side with a series of baffles. A key aspect in this technique is to understand the interaction of the fluid dynamics and heat transfer. Computational fluid dynamics simulations and experiments were performed to analysis the 3-dimensional flow and heat transfer on the shell side of an STHE with and without baffles. Although, it was found that there was a small difference in the average exit temperature between the two cases, the heat transfer coefficient was locally enhanced in the baffled case due to flow structures. The flow in the unbaffled case was highly streamed, while for the baffled case the flow was a highly complex flow with vortex structures formed by the tip of the baffles, the tubes, and the interaction of flow with the shell wall.

Interest in thermoelectric devices (TEDs) for waste-heat recovery applications has recently increased due to a growing global environmental consciousness and the potential economic benefits of increasing cycle efficiency. Unlike conventional waste-heat recovery systems like the organic Rankine cycle, TEDs are steady-state, scalable apparatus that directly convert a temperature difference into electricity using the Seebeck effect. The benefits of TEDS, namely steady-state operation and scalability, are often outweighed by their low performance in terms of thermal conversion efficiency and power output. To address the issue of poor device performance, this dissertation takes a multi-faceted approach focusing on device modeling, analysis and design and material processing.

First, a complete one-dimensional thermal resistance network is developed to analytically model a TED, including heat exchangers, support structures and thermal and electrical contact resistances. The purpose of analytical modeling is twofold: to introduce an optimization algorithm of the thermoelectric material geometry based upon the realized temperature difference to maximize thermal conversion efficiency and power output; and to identify areas within the conventional TED that can be restructured to allow for a greater temperature difference across the junction and hence increased performance. Additionally, this model incorporates a component on the numerical resolution of radiation view factors within a TED cavity to properly model radiation heat transfer. Results indicate that geometric optimization increases performance upwards of 30% and the hot-side ceramic diminishes realized temperature difference. The resulting analytical model is validated with published numerical and comparable analytical models, and serves as a basis for experimental studies.

Second, an integrated thermoelectric device is presented. The integrated TED is a restructured TED that eliminates the hot-side ceramic and directly incorporates the hot-side heat exchanger into the hot-side interconnector, reducing the thermal resistance between source and hot-side junction. A single-state and multi-stage pin-fin integrated TED are developed and tested experimentally, and the performance characteristics are shown for a wide range of operating fluid temperatures and flow rates. Due to the eliminated to thermal restriction, the integrated TED shows unique performance characteristics in comparison to conventional TED, indicating increased performance.

Finally, a grain-boundary engineering approach to material processing of bulk bismuth telluride (Bi₂Te₃) is presented. Using uniaxial compaction and sintering techniques, the preferred crystallographic orientation (PCO) and coherency of grains, respectively, are controlled. The effect of sintering temperature on thermoelectric properties, specifically Seebeck coefficient, thermal conductivity and electrical resistivity, are determined for samples which exhibited the highest PCO. It is shown the performance of bulk Bi₂Te₃ produced by the presented method is comparable to that of nano-structured materials, with a maximum figure of merit of 0.40 attained at 383 K.