Sharif Digital Repository

Compressibility factor (z-factor) values of natural gasses are essential in most petroleum and chemical engineering calculations. The most common sources of z-factor values are laboratory experiments, empirical correlations and equations of state methods. Necessity arises when there is no available experimental data for the required composition, pressure and temperature conditions. Introduced here is a technique to predict z-factor values of natural gasses, sour reservoir gasses and pure substances. In this communication, a novel mathematical-based approach was proposed to develop reliable model for prediction of compressibility factor of sour and natural gas. A robust soft computing... 

The hydraulic efficiency of sedimentation basins is reduced by short-circuiting, circulation zones and bottom particleladen jets. Baffles are used to improve the sediment tank performance. In this study, laboratory experiments were used to examine the hydrodynamics of several baffle configurations. An accompanying numerical analysis was performed based on the 2-D Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes equations along with the k-ε turbulence closure model. The numerical model was supplemented with the volume-of-fluid technique, and the advection-diffusion equation to simulate the dynamics of particle-laden flow. Model predictions compared well with the experimental data. An empirical function was... 

Reviewing the various Partial Discharges (PD data mining researches which have been reported so far, this study compares the performance of different feature spaces and different classifiers employed for PD classification in insulation condition monitoring of power transformers. In this process, first a knowledge basis is developed through construction of 4 different types of PD models in the high voltage laboratory. Background noise is considered as one class in this knowledge basis. The high frequency time domain current signals of high voltage equipment are captured over one power frequency cycle. The single PD activities within this captured signal are extracted by application of a... 

Today, tailored welded blank sheets have found various applications in automotive, aeronautic and many other industrial fields. One of the most efficient methods for production of tailored welded blank sheets is application of the friction stir welding process. In the present article, the effect of friction stir welding parameters on the microstructure and mechanical properties of heterogeneous tailored welded blank sheets made from aluminium alloys of types 5083-H12 and 6061-T6 with the similar thickness of 1.5 mm is studied. The considered parameters are rotational speed of the tool, linear speed of the tool, pin diameter and shoulder diameter. In order to come by a tailored welded blank... 

The aim of this study was to develop an appropriate kinetic model for propane dehydrogenation (PDH) over an industrial Pt-Sn/γ-Al 2O 3 catalyst in the presence of small amounts of oxygenated compounds. Experimental data were obtained from a previous study where catalytic PDH was carried out in a laboratory scale reactor at atmospheric pressure in the temperature range of 575-620 °C in the presence of small amounts of water or methanol. The kinetics of the main dehydrogenation reaction was described and the effects of water and methanol on coke deposition and catalyst sintering were considered in a catalyst deactivation model to explain the observed optimum level in the amount of added... 

Enhanced Oil Recovery techniques are gaining more attention worldwide as the proved oil reserves are declining and the oil price is hiking. Although many giant oil reservoirs in the world were already screened for EOR processes, the main challenges such as low sweep efficiency, costly techniques, possible formation damages, transportation of huge amounts of EOR agents to the fields especially for offshore cases, analyzing micro-scale multi-phase flow in the rock to the large scale tests and the lack of analyzing tools in traditional experimental works, hinder the proposed EOR processes. Our past experiences on using nanotechnology to the upstream cases, especially EOR processes, revealed... 

Floating urbanization could be the subject of a green flood mitigation strategy. The main part of any floating house is the buoyant part, which is made from concrete pontoons. Aggregates play the most important role in making concrete a lightweight material. Oil Palm Shell (OPS) is an agricultural waste material, which is widely available in South East Asia. This study tries to select the best cementing material from waste and produced pozzolans, to improve the specifications of green lightweight concrete with Oil Palm Shell (OPS), using decision-making methods. The decision making model was conducted by the application of a Fuzzy Preference Selection Index (PSI). Quantitative data was... 

The finite number of toroidal field coils of a tokamak destroys the perfect axisymmetry of the device. The coils produce a short wavelength ripple in the toroidal magnetic field strength as a field line follows round the torus, which becomes important in transport and confinement properties of plasma. Hence, a quick and accurate estimation of ripple becomes important. We have noticed that a previously reported analytical formulation by Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory team is not applicable to our large aspect ratio tokamak, and have devised a slightly modified form which has greatly improved the accuracy of the analytical fit  

Simulation is the gold standard for training in aviation and trauma medicine. Now it is available for diseases diagnosis and treatment. With simulation, clinicians can practice their art in a realistic, consequence free environment, combining both theory and practice in a comprehensive program. Method and materials - In the virtual clinical environment of "VPsoft mentor" software, the practitioner reviews a patient's history, orders laboratory tests and procedures, interprets findings, renders diagnoses, and prescribes medication. Every diagnostic or treatment decision the clinician makes for the patient is analyzed by E-mentor, providing instant feedback.Results - This software have been... 

The application of flat superconductor rings has been investigated in the structure of inductive shield-type high temperature superconducting fault current limiters, HT c-SFCL. A laboratory scale inductive shield-type HT c-SFCL has been designed and fabricated using flat superconductor rings. The fabrication process has been fully presented. YBCO powder has been used for the fabrication of superconductor rings. This fabrication process, being quite innovative, is introduced completely. The method of the trapped field measurement has been used for the critical current density measurement of the fabricated superconductor rings. The device with nominal current of 2 A was tested in a 30 V... 

Toe to heel air injection has been studied on non-fractured sandstone models and is found to be a promising enhanced oil recovery method for certain heavy oil reservoirs, such as those in Canada, but its applicability on fractured reservoirs, such as those in the Middle East, is not investigated yet. The objective of this article is to evaluate the effect of fractures geometrical parameters, such as fracture density, orientation, and location, on the performance of the process in laboratory scale. Simulation results showed that toe-to-heel air injection is more applicable on highly networked fractured reservoirs, such as those that occur in Persian Gulf coast compared to lower density... 

The top-down in situ combustion (ISC) involves the stable propagation of the combustion front from the top vertical injector to the bottom horizontal producer. Apart from laboratory studies in conventional sandstones, no application of the process in fractured carbonates has been addressed yet. The authors modified a successful combustion tube history matched model of an Iranian low-permeable heavy oil reservoir called Kuh-E-Mond to investigate the feasibility of ISC in fractured carbonate reservoirs mimicking block-scale combustion cells. Effects of fractured geometrical properties such as orientation, location, extension, density, spacing, and dispersion were considered. Results confirmed... 

This work examines the operational parameters that may influence the performance of toe-to-heel steamflooding in a laboratory-scale simulation model built on the basis of the fluid and rock samples from a fractured, low-permeable, carbonate heavy oil reservoir in Southwestern Iran, called KEM (Kuh-e-Mond). Using vertical (V) or horizontal (H) injectors (I) and producers (P), the effects of different well configurations including VIVP, VIHP, 2VIHP, VI2HP, HIHP, and HI2HP, injectors' traversal distance, producers' traversal distance, and horizontal producer length have been investigated. In summary, the results show that 2VIHP scheme performs best in terms of oil recovery and areal/volumetric... 

The mathematical techniques of decision making are among the most valuable outcomes of this research activity, which is generally referred to as realization in the operations, operational research or quantitative methods of decision making. Over time, with the increase in the complexity and the variety of decision making problems, the methods of decision making become more varied and will have more capability of problem solving. Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) is a collection of methodologies to compare, select, or rank multiple alternatives that involve incommensurate attributes. Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) method is a multiple criteria... 

Distributed power generation and the ever-growing load demand have caused fault current levels to exceed the nominal rating of the power system devices, and fault current limiters are more needed. Superconducting fault current limiter (SFCL) forms an important category of current limiters. In this paper, a novel flux-based model for the inductive shield-type high-temperature SFCL is developed based on the Bean model. This model is employed to simulate the SFCL performance in a sample circuit. Utilizing the model, the signal characterization of the limited current is determined. A prototype laboratory scale SFCL has been fabricated with superconducting rings. Yttrium barium copper oxide... 

Spontaneous imbibition of water into the matrix blocks because of capillary forces is an important recovery mechanism for oil recovery from naturally fractured reservoirs. In modeling this process, it has been assumed classically that local equilibrium is reached and, therefore, capillary pressure and relative permeability functions are only a function of water saturation, resulting in the appearance of the self-similarity condition. In some works published in the last 2 decades, it has, however, been claimed that local equilibrium is not reached in porous media, and therefore, opposite the classical local-equilibrium/self-similar approach, non-equilibrium effects should be taken into... 

Friction stir welding (FSW) is a relatively new solid-state joining technique that is widely adopted in manufacturing and industry fields to join different metallic alloys that are hard to weld by conventional fusion welding. Friction stir welding is a very complex process comprising several highly coupled physical phenomena. The complex geometry of some kinds of joints makes it difficult to develop an overall governing equations system for theoretical behavior analyse of the friction stir welded joints. Weld quality is predominantly affected by welding effective parameters, and the experiments are often time consuming and costly. On the other hand, employing artificial intelligence (AI)... 

This work aims to discuss the results of wide ranges of laboratory investigations to evaluate the performance of a newly-formulated surfactant for heavy oil reservoirs in order to improve the microscopic sweep efficiency after water flooding processes. In the first part, the specific behavior of the formulated surfactant including its salinity tolerance, interfacial tension, and optimum performance window was determined. Then, the application of surfactant solutions in real sandstone reservoir rocks was assessed for both oil-wet and water-wet cases. Besides, the effect of changing the capillary and viscous forces and interfacial tension on the residual phase saturations were characterized.... 

The non-heat-treatable AA3003-H18 plates were joined by friction stir welding (FSW) to achieve a proper joint by optimizing the welding parameters. For this purpose, the effects of heat input on microstructure and mechanical properties of the welded samples were investigated by changing the ratios of rotational speed (800-1200 r/min) to travel speed (40-100 mm/min) (ω/v). It was revealed that the grain growth rate was strongly increased with the increase of the heat input by rotational speed at constant travel speed, while the grain growth rate was slightly increased with the increase of the heat input by travel speed at constant rotational speed. Subsequently, hardness reduction was... 

Magneto-rheological (MR) fluids consist of magnetic particles in carrying fluid. One of the drawbacks in using MR dampers in laboratory work is their price. At present, there is a compelling need for the production of the laboratory scale of MR fluids to lower their production cost. In this study, to show that the MR fluid is an applicable prototyped laboratory scale of single ended and mono-tube, MR dampers with a prototyped MR fluid are presented. The main features of produced MR fluid and dampers are simplifying in constructing and their low cost. These dampers are useful for laboratory research work. To illustrate the validity of the MR fluids, using this fluid, four MR dampers are made...