Faculty of Engineering, Built Environment and Information Technology
School of Engineering
Department of Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering
Selected Highlights from Research Findings
The research foci in the Department of Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering are organised in the Dynamic Systems Group, with thrusts in vibration monitoring and diagnostics, vibration measurement and analysis, structural dynamic design and analysis, vehicle dynamics and computational solid mechanics, the Thermofluids Research Group, with thrusts in enhanced heat transfer, electronics cooling, micro channel condensation, optimisation with constructal theory, and the Design and Manufacturing Group, with thrusts in mine health and safety, biomechanics, and the lubricity of diesel. The Chair in Maintenance Engineering is associated with the department.
The Dynamic Systems Group contributed to the methodologies of the numerical durability assessment of heavy vehicle structures, the use of Vold-Kalman filter-order tracking in the vibration monitoring of electrical machines, the monitoring of tool wear and the setting of optimum cutting conditions considering progressive tool wear effects and input uncertainties, the use of neural networks to assess the residual life of machines and components, the online condition monitoring of axial-flow turbomachinery blades using rotor-axial Eulerian laser Doppler vibrometry, the monitoring of the condition of rock bolts using ultrasonic guided waves, the development of a tailless gull-wing aircraft by investigating its pitch-handling characteristics, the handling properties of off-road vehicles by the development of an interconnected air-spring model, and the development and optimisation of a gradient-based approximation method for the optimisation of a vehicle suspension system.
The Thermofluids Research Group made contributions through the investigation of heat transfer enhancement using helical inserts in smooth tubes, the evaluation of constructal ducts with wrinkled entrances, the development of an improved flow pattern map for the accurate prediction of the heat transfer coefficients during condensation of R-134a working fluid in smooth horizontal tubes in the low-mass flux range, and by conducting an experimental study of heat transfer augmentation near the entrance to a film-cooling hole in a turbine-blade cooling passage. Enhanced heat transfer from electronic devices through embedded heat-spreading layers in rectangular heat-generating electronic modules, and the development of a non-numerical calculation method for heat removal from power electronics using embedded solid state cooling layers were also examined.
The Design and Manufacturing Group made significant contributions to improving mine health and safety with the development of a quiet, self-propelled rock drill, a dynamic roof support system for tabular stopes, a roof support system for rockfall mines, a universal load-indicating device to be used in conjunction with various support systems, and an alternative to onboard scrubbers for continuous miners to decrease dust levels and increase the amount of ventilation in the panel. The group also contributed to solving the problems experienced with diesel engines by investigating the role that diesel lubricity and cleanliness play in the premature failure of these engines.
Contact person: Prof JP Meyer.
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