In this work, the influence of composition and cold-drawing on nanoand micro-scale morphology and tensile mechanical properties of PE/organoclay nanocomposite fibers was investigated. Nanocomposites were prepared by melt compounding in a twin-screw extruder, using a maleic anhydride grafted linear low density polyethylene (LLDPE–g–MA) and an organomodified montmorillonite (Dellite 67G) at three...

The Machine Drawing Understanding System (MDUS) is an experimental CAD conversion system aimed at realizing the entire process of understanding mechanical engineering drawings, from scanning to three-dimensional (3-D) reconstruction. This paper describes the structure, algorithms and current performance of MDUS. The modular structure of the system provides for further improvements and makes it ...

The overarching purpose of the group’s studies lies in elucidating the variety of ways in which materials and structures accommodate deformation and carry load at different scales and levels of organisation. To this end, mechanical microscopy is underpinned by multi-scale simulation using analytical and numerical methods and drawing on advanced finite element modelling, dislocation dynamics, mo...

Simulated annealing is a multivariable optimization technique based on the Monte Carlo method used in statistical mechanical studies of condensed systems and follows by drawing an analogy between energy minimization in physical systems and costs minimization in design applications. In this paper, simulated annealing is introduced and reviewed. The utility of the method for optimization of chemi...

Mechanical design and manufacturing information for 3-D solid objects has been eeectively conveyed through a set of annotated orthographic projections and optional cross-sections. This forms the basis of engineering drawings, which solve the problem of unambiguously representing a 3-D object on a 2-D plane. In this paper we address the inverse problem: given an engineering drawing of an object,...

The cup drawing is a basic deep drawing process. Thus, understanding the mechanics ofthe cup drawing process helps in determining the general parameters that affect the deep drawingprocess. There are mainly two methods of analysis; experimental and analytical/numerical.Experimental analysis can be useful in analyzing the process to determine the process parameters thatproduce a defect free prod...