Mehran University Research Journal of Engineering and Technology

6

Authors: Mukesh Kumar, Muhammad Moazam Baloch, Muhammad Ishaque Abro, Sikandar Ali Memon, Ali Dad Chandio

Aluminum alloys have been attracted by several engineering sectors due to their excellent strength weight ratio and corrosion resistant properties. These are categorized into 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7and 8xxx on the basis of alloying elements. Among these 6xxx series contains aluminum–magnesium–silicon as alloying elements and are widely used in extruded products and automotive body panels. The major advantages of these alloys are good corrosion resistance, medium strength, low cost, age hardening response no yield point phenomenon and Ludering. 6xxx series alloys generally have lower formability than other aluminum alloys which restrict their utilization for wide applications. Keeping in view of the shortcomings in the set of mechanical properties of 6xxx series the efforts were made to improve the tensile strength and toughness properties through age hardening. In present study heat treatment cycles were studied for 6061 aluminum alloy. Three different age hardening temperatures 160, 200 and 240oC were selected. The obtained results showed that 17.26, 7.69, and 10.51% improvement in tensile strength, toughness and hardness respectively was achieved with solution treatment at 380oC followed by an aging 240oC. Microstructural study revealed that substantial improvements in the mechanical properties of 6061 aluminum alloy under heat treatment were achieved due to precipitation of Mg2Si secondary phase.

8

Authors: Sanjha Khan, Bilal Athar

The aim of this research is to develop a decentralized communication system of multiple robots which have capability to communicate and coordinate with each other, by which all robots work individually while keeping connectivity among them. Decentralized communication between robots is the main part of this project. This type of communication shows great potential in many aspects. A decentralized system is the combination of both intelligent and decision making inspired from nature. To meet this object two identical robots are developed which successfully communicate with each other to complete an assigned task. A single task is given to both robots; to find specific object/target location. Once the target is found by any of the robot that robot will then communicate with second robot to guide the path of object/target location. Guiding path to the second robot is the challenging task as discussed in this paper. The Robots use Bluetooth devices to calculate and extract the RSSI (Received Signal Strength Indication)values for communication purpose.Both robots work together as a team. By working in communicated way their time is reduced to achieve the task and create synergy. Any task could be easily attained in team work than by the work of the single individual robot.

10

Authors: Samiullah Sohu, Abdul Fattah Chandio, Kaleem ullah

The problem of delay in construction industry is a regular phenomenon worldwide, and construction industry of Pakistan has no exception, particularly in highways projects. Delay can be described as the extension of time to complete the construction project. The aim of this paper is to identify main causes of delays in highway projects of Pakistan, and to determine mitigating measures for the identified causes. The research method of this study is based on literature review, questionnaire survey and semi structured interview. From in-depth literature review, twenty-six common causes of delay were found. A questionnaire survey was carried out among construction professionals of highway projects. The causes of delay in highways projects were ranked referring to their Mean values. A semi structured interview was carried out to determine mitigation measures for the top ten causes of delays. The data gathered from questionnaire survey was analyzed using SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) while, data collected through semi structured interviews was analyzed using Nvivo software. The findings of this study are expected to be useful for construction parties, to mitigate the delays in highway construction projects of Pakistan.

12

Authors: Sajid Mehmood, Faheem Butt

This study investigated the effects of steel fibers on the fresh and hardened properties, and heat of hydration of concrete containing FA (Fly Ash). A total of 192 samples were cast comprising cubes, cylinders, and prisms, for six concrete mixes with varying contents of steel fibers by volume and a fixed content of FA i.e. 15% by weight of cement. The semi adiabatic setup was used to monitor temperature rise due to the heat of hydration in the concrete mixes for fourteen days. The use of FA increased workability, and decreased early compressive strength, tensile strength and heat of hydration of concrete. However, an increase in the compressive strength of FA concrete was observed by the addition of steel fibers up to 0.9% whereas a consistent increase in the splitting tensile strength and modulus of rupture was observed with the addition of the steel fibers from 0.4-1.8%. Further the test results showed that increasing steel fibers content decrease the evolution of heat due to hydration. It was concluded that the FA concrete with steel fibers can be used in precast industry and mass construction projects due to the improved mechanical properties and lower heat of hydration.

12

Authors: Majeed Ahmed, Syed Anwar Ali Zaidi

The intent of study is to establish a criterion for the experimental setup of rasterstereography, one that is more efficient, simple, accurate and precise to examine and analyse the curvature of the object or the subject. Firstly, the setup is needed to be calibrated and for this purpose we considered a reference plane, eleven cylinders of different diameter ranging from 30-119mm were used for calibration of curvature maps of cylinders and cylindrical objects through the regression line. Further this model was tested on subjects and for that we reckoned cylindrical body parts of boys and a total of 30 college students were involved as subjects in this process. The body parts to be measured had curvature like cylinders of different diameters ranging from 42-120mm. The distortion of raster grid was observed, quantified and recorded with the help of different tools and results were established. The regression line was obtained between the measured (x) and computed (y). The standard error of the cylindrical object was 0.04 and that of cylindrical body parts of subjects was 0.0407. This technique was validated through the coefficient of correlation for objects and subjects which was found to be 0.99982 and 0.999141 respectively. Accuracy and Precision were also calculated for this model, which were 99.60% accurate and 99.49% precise. Curvature maps were found more than 99%. This technique is inexpensive, reliable, reproducible and may be installed easily in hospitals to examine appraise body shape, composition and deformities of young men

12

Authors: Bismah Hasan, Kamran Raza

Slotted circular printed layered patch antenna is designed, simulated and fabricated for 5G (Fifth Generation) wireless communication applications. The antenna consists of slots in the main radiating circular patch element for miniaturizing the size of the radiating element and providing dual band radiation characteristics. The feed line is separated on bottom substrate layer with EBG (Electromagnetic Band-Gap) embedded for enhancing the gain characteristics of the antenna. Superstrate layer is also used for improving the gain of the antenna where the distance from the radiating antenna element is optimized for maximizing the impedance bandwidth and radiation characteristics. The feed realization and impedance matching of the radiating slotted circular patch antenna is done by inducing slot at the middle ground plane of the slot embedded circular patch antenna system. The proposed configuration provides power radiation gain values of more than 5 dB for the Ka band of communications, whereas the impedance bandwidth of the antenna is verified for the dual resonances at 27.5 and 28.5 GHz. Dual band radiation characteristics are attained by embedding and optimizing the slot length and width in the circular patch radiator element that is placed on the upper face of the substrate RT Rogers Duroid 5880 layer. The length of the microstrip feed line embedded in the lower layer of the substrate is optimized for providing required bandwidth characteristics for the dual frequency point radiations. The antenna configuration is designed, modeled and simulated in CST (Central Standard Time) Microwave studio. The antenna is fabricated and measured vs simulated frequency response, gain patterns and current density plots are presented for the verification of antenna operation in the desired frequency bands.

14

Authors: Azka Maqsood, Imran Touqir, Adil Masood Siddiqui, Maham Haider

Wavelet based image processing techniques do not strictly follow the conventional probabilistic models that are unrealistic for real world images. However, the key features of joint probability distributions of wavelet coefficients are well captured by HMT (Hidden Markov Tree) model. This paper presents the HMT model based technique consisting of Wavelet based Multiresolution analysis to enhance the results in image processing applications such as compression, classification and denoising. The proposed technique is applied to colored video sequences by implementing the algorithm on each video frame independently. A 2D (Two Dimensional) DWT (Discrete Wavelet Transform) is used which is implemented on popular HMT model used in the framework of Expectation-Maximization algorithm. The proposed technique can properly exploit the temporal dependencies of wavelet coefficients and their non-Gaussian performance as opposed to existing wavelet based denoising techniques which consider the wavelet coefficients to be jointly Gaussian or independent. Denoised frames are obtained by processing the wavelet coefficients inversely. Comparison of proposed method with the existing techniques based on CPSNR (Coloured Peak Signal to Noise Ratio), PCC (Pearson’s Correlation Coefficient) and MSSIM (Mean Structural Similarity Index) has been carried out in detail.The proposed denoising method reveals improved results in terms of quantitative and qualitative analysis for both additive and multiplicative noise and retains nearly all the structural contents of a video frame

14

Authors: Kashif Rehman, Aftab Ahmed

The insufficiency of energy resources, increased cost of generation and rising load demand necessitate optimized economic dispatch. The real world ED (Economic Dispatch) is highly non-convex, nonlinear and discontinuous problem with different equality and inequality constraints. In this research paper, a novel hybrid MFO-SQP (Moth Flame Optimization with Sequential Quadratic Programming) is proposed to solve the ED problem. The MFO is stochastic searching algorithm minimizes by random search and SQP is definite in nature that refines the local search in vicinity of local minima. Proposed technique has been implemented on 6, 15 and 40 units test system with different constraints like valve point loading effect, transmission loss, prohibited zones, generator capacity limits and power balance. Results, obtained from proposed technique are compared with those of the techniques reported in the literature, are proven better in terms of fuel cost and convergence.

16

Authors: Sarwat Iqbal, Sanaullah, Kamran Ahsan, Muhammad Saeed, Muhammad Azhar Hussain

Collection and delivery of laundry is an important process in the laundry business. The laundry businesses have adopted diverse models such as over the counter collection/delivery, online booking etc. The laundries are collected or delivered from customers’ doorstep or from customers’ desired location at a convenient time. In this paper, business process re-engineering concept has been incorporated to improve the collection and delivery process of laundry using RFID (Radio-Frequency Identification) tagging and Automated Laundry Collection Drop Box. The Devil’s Quadrangle has been used as a tool for evaluation. The proposed model will result in reduction in cost, time and improvement in service quality. It ultimately results in customers’ loyalty, economic efficiency and gain of a competitive advantage over competitor. Other advantages for laundry business include automatic collection and delivery, enhanced customer convenience, enhanced flexibility and industry economic savings, enhanced customer satisfaction and decreased labor work. In the proposed automated laundry collection model, reputed laundry businesses will make a consortium and outsource collection and delivery process to a courier company. Different collection and delivery options are proposed in the model.

16

Authors: Muhammad Yousaf Ali Khan, Ehtasham Mustafa, Aamir Nawaz, Nasir Saleem, Usman Illahi

Autonomous navigation of the vehicles or robots is very challenging and useful task used by many scientists and researchers these days. By keeping this fact in mind, an algorithm for autonomous navigation of mobile robot in outdoor environment is proposed. This navigation track consists of colored border containing obstacles and some unplanned surfaces along with some specific points for GPS (Global Positioning System) alarms. The main goal is to avoid colored border and obstacles. For the vision problem webcam is used. First the colored border is detected by using OpenCV library by following HSI (Hue Saturation Intensity)technique. The Canny edge algorithm is used to find both edges of the border, then for detecting straight lines on both sides of track, Hough transformation is used. Finally, the closest border line is detected and its center point is calculated for which the mobile robot has to steer to avoid it. Second step is to avoid the obstacles, which is done by LRF (Laser Range Finder), first the range of LRF is defined, because not all obstacles have to be avoided, only those obstacles are detected and avoided which are in specified range as defined before, and finally GPS receiver is used to make alarms at some specific points. As a result, a successful navigation of the mobile robot in the outdoor environment is implemented.