Sharif Digital Repository

During the drilling process, cutting concentration in vertical and inclined wells is a common problem and major issue in designing hydraulic parameters. This is becoming more important in near bit area. Cutting transport usually is affected by several parameters such as mud rheology, flow rate, nozzle size, rotation speed, and mud weight.
In this work it was aimed to design a new set-up to test all the factors on hole cleaning phenomenon especially in near bit area. The set-up consists of a 16 feet long flow loop, 3.28 feet height of the test section, and 3.33 inches inner diameter of the test section. Each parameter which has an impact on hole cleaning could be varied. The cutting... 

In this research a robotic fish was designed and fabricated. For this propose different types of manufactured robotic fish were investigated and this model was developed and made with a one-piece flexible tail with an actuator that creates lateral movement through cable strings attached to the tail. Proposed mechanism has a simple, low cost structure that facilitates the control of the robotic fish movement. To control this robotic fish, a four-channel radio controller with 40 kHz frequency, was used. Swimming mode of this robotic fish is categorized in Subcarangiform swimming mode which is faster and has better maneuverability compared to its counterparts. It should be noted that the... 

In recent years, industrial robots have been greatly used as orienting devices in industry, especially in the automotive, shipbuilding and aerospace manufacturing industries. Industrial robots are gradually finding their niche in manufacturing, replacing less universal and more expensive CNC-machines. Application area of robots is constantly growing; they begin to be used for the assembly, pick-and-place operations, machining operations and etc. The use of robots for machining operations is growing because of their flexibility to perform a broad spectrum of tasks at a lower cost when compared with machine tools. Recently, parallel robots have attracted more and more researchers’ attention in... 

Exoskeleton is a wearable active device used to augment human power in upper or lower extremities. The integration of robotic devices and conventional physiotherapy is becoming more and more acceptable worldwide. The main scope of this thesis is to design and develop a prototype of a light, low-cost and wearable robotic exoskeleton to rehabilitate the upper extremity in stroke patients at home. For this purpose mechanism of a wearable exoskeleton will be proposed compatible with upper extremity degrees of freedoms with minimum number of actuators which is constructed inexpensively to eliminate the demand of expensive and professional therapists. The conceptual design of such a system should... 

Cars with high center of gravity, such as SUV-Sport Utility Vehicles- have high tendency to roll over in high speeds and rapid maneuvers. An idea formerly proposed is to use a high speed rotating disc like a gyroscope on the onset of the rollover to exert a high stabilizing moment on the vehicle, and consequently prevent rollovers. Also using two counter rotating discs with opposite nutation will prevent interference with the car other degrees of freedom. To reduce the interference of the spinning discs with the vehicle dynamics, the discs are to be brought to speed by the action of a high accelerating mechanism during the rollover process(similar to the action of an airbag). This project... 

Delivering high quality and clean air into occupied spaces is the main goal of Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) systems. HVAC systems draw supply air which usually contains fungi and moisture. Fungi and moisture plus organic materials create a good bed for mold growth. Studies prove that duct cleaning process can definitely reduce the amount of pollutants present in the ducts. Hence, it has positive impact on human lives both regarding psychological and physical points of view. Duct cleaning method’s application difficulties and ducts’ unreachable environments motivated duct cleaning firms to employ robots for duct cleaning tasks. Although there are considerable numbers of... 

Cascade impactors are the instruments which are used to assess the particle size distribution and the cut off diameter. Cascade impactors are wildly used for hygiene purposes, environmental, and toxicological studies. However, to find out the accurate size distribution, the cut off diameter of each stage which is different for different types of impactors with different geometry specifications should be determined. In this study first the basis of the cascade impactor operation is described. Next, different types of cascade impactors are introduced, and the Andersen Cascade Impactor (ACI) is chosen to design. The design criteria are explained and the dimension of each stage, entrance cone,... 

The main scope of this research is to develop an anthropometric lower extremity exoskeleal system in a virtual environment for augmentation purposes. The main challenge in the process of doing this research is to employ the biomechanical analysis of the human locomotion to provide the necessary background information for the design of devices that closely mimic the dynamics of the operator's motion. In this case, the appropriate degrees-of-freedom and associated range of motions for each joint should be determined. In addition, the kind of necessary actuators and measurement systems should be selected based on the muscle torque consumption analysis provided by a musculoskeletal model,... 

This thesis is aimed at the modeling and control of atomic force microscope (AFM) in order to improve the scanning speed and achieving video-rate imaging to realize the real-time observation of dynamic phenomena at the nanoscale. The lumped parameter model of the AFM in the non-contact operation mode is studied in this project. The tip-sample interaction is the Van der Waals force, which makes the model nonlinear. Two mathematical models of the AFM cantilever are derived and investigated in order to gain detailed insights into the system dynamics. These models are tip excited and base excited cantilever. The former is solved by the method of multiple scales and the latter is analyzed by the... 

Ni-P alloy coatings were electrodeposited using pulse current in a watt type bath in various conditions. The influences of different parameters were investigated and optimized for the highest amount of coating hardness using the Design Of Experiment (DOE) method. The optimized deposition parameters were current density 23.7 A/dm2, duty cycle 75%, frequency equal to 188 Hz, temperature equal to 70ºC and 17.5 gr/l of H3PO3. The DOE prediction of hardness for the optimized coatings was between 700 and 750 the achieved micro-hardness was about 725.8 HV. It was obtained that an increase of the current density will improve micro-hardness, decreases P content and increase deposition rate. Also, the... 

In this thesis, the hardness of Ni-Cr alloys is optimized by design of experiment (DOE) method (Central Composite Design) in pulse electrodeposition performed in chloride solution. Various parameters were evaluated for finding significant factors in pulse electrodeposition of Ni-Cr alloy. Frequency, duty cycle, current density and temperature were selected as effective factors. 30 experiments were designed by the central composite design method. Analyses of Variance (ANOVA) were performed on the results of these 30 experiments. The best models which can predict the hardness, Cr content, deposition rate, thickness and cathode efficiency of Ni-Cr alloy electrodeposits were found and... 

Neuron models are the elementary units, which determine the performance of an Artificial Spiking Neural Network (ASNN) as they are known to be a particular class of machine learning methods. The ASNNs that are inspired by the features of biological neurons and organizational structure of biological nervous system as the third generation of Artificial Neural Networks (ANN). This thesis concentrates on study of biologically plausible neuron; based on Fuzzy approach and tries to develop fuzzy state of Leaky Integrate and Fire (LIF) model, in order to resemble closely the neuron-electrical dynamics for ASNN in most efficient way. In this study, the Fuzzy methods including TAKAGI-SUGENO-KANG... 

Abstract
In this research, the effect of irregularity in the plan floor of structures, including geometric and torsional irregularity on the seismic behavior of steel moment frames braced with chevron knee braces (CKBs) has been investigated. To achieve this, three–dimensional 5-, 8-, 12-story steel buildings models with regular and irregular plan floors were built in OpenSees software and subjected to nonlinear static (pushover) and nonlinear incremental dynamic analysis (IDA) under 22 ground motion records. The performance of each model was then examined by calculation of three seismic design parameters: response modification (R), structural over strength (Ω), and structural ductility... 

Today, with the replacement of the old method of force-based design by the new method of performance-based design in structural and earthquake engineering, many structural and earthquake researchers have focused in their studies on this area. The performance-based design aims at enabling engineers to design structures with predictable performance. Designing space structures has particular complexities. In space structures, the failure of a structural member does not necessarily mean the failure of the entire structure, because the redistribution of power will occur between the adjacent members after the failure of a member and the structure can thus have further support capacity. Similarly,... 

Prestressed concrete structures are used all around the world widely; especially for elements which are under the effects of bending like prestressed concrete slabs. In these sorts of elements the aim of designing is to control the tensional stresses and the cracks delivering higher strength. This can improve the capabilities of the structure, architecturally and economically. Seismic design of structures is based on horizontal component of ground motions. In recent years, it has been observed that the vertical component of ground motion could be stronger than horizontal one especially for those which have happened in near field sources. In these kinds of earthquakes the importance of... 

In building construction, a rigid vertical diaphragm is capable of transferring lateral forces from exterior walls, roofs and floors to the ground foundation in a direction parallel to its planes.[1] Refractory elements against lateral forces contain moment frames, shear walls or a combination of them. In this research, shear walls are discussed. Nowadays, in cities having old contexture, some of the buildings should be destructed. Thus, modern buildings should be built. Due to the limitation of adequate space and lack of symmetrical plan, buildings must be built in asymmetrical form. To design the structures with asymmetrical plan, it is necessary to study buildings with presence of... 

Light cold formed steel structures have a wide use in building constructions and industrial projects due to their economical advantages, rapid erection and installation and capability for industrial mass production. The main objective of this thesis is to investigate the seismic behavior and to study the seismic requirements for design of Light steel frames (LSF) structures. The cold forming technique, and the basic concepts of cold formed steel members design have been investigated and the basic concepts of seismic design of light cold formed steel structures is discussed. In order to investigate the performance of steel strap framed wall systems and estimate its response modification... 

The pervious Iranian seismic code has not considered the ductility parameter in the seismic design of (steel) structures. , therefore; seismic vulnerability and retrofit of existing steel structures is becoming a vital engineering problem. Common ways of seismic retrofit such as adding a shear wall or bracing the structure cause huge forces in elements and foundations. Rehabilitation on the foundation has many constructional problems and leads to long down time. As far as known, the Infill Walls increase the lateral stiffness of frames and lead to reducing the period of the structure. Therefore, to have a reliable design, it is important to consider the effects of Infill Walls. It can be...