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Trucks are becoming home to more and more on-board-computers (OBCs). One key to managing the influx of new technology is to expand the truck’s current network architecture. Another key is to integrate features into a high performance, expandable truck oriented computer. Many new technologies will be reviewed, including USB, MOST, IEEE 1394, Bluetooth, IDB-M, speech recognition and a comparison of optical or copper networking. This session will discuss issues in selecting suitable network topologies, computing architectures, methods of technology integration, and the migration of new computer and communications technology to the truck environment.

This paper seeks to highlight some of the problems related to deregulation of the airline industry as seen by a major European airline. While deregulation hit the U.S. industry fast and hard, the European operators could enjoy a more slowly emerging relaxation of the traditional tight government control. Nevertheless, the increased competition encountered on the European arena the last ten years has called for decisive action and revised strategies in order to survive. On the basis of the U.S. experience and the general trend in Europe particularly, Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) set out to reorganize the structure of the company and adopt new strategies for the future. In order to anticipate the different markets emerging, SAS established clear quality priorities. Thereafter the company specified standards and goals for some defined strategic operational areas.

Studies in a jet passenger airliner to service shorter routes than those of the Boeing 707 evolved the concept of a rear mounted three engine jet, the 727. The development program had many facets, including extensive use of mockups, customer influence on design through liaison, cost control, and a considerable amount of work on the design of the tail and location and number of engines on the craft.

The ALS Element (Program) has established the ALS metric as its means of measuring project performance. Programmatic goals are to drive the metric upward by a factor of 3 by 2014, thereby reducing the cost of keeping people alive in space. To assess the feasibility of achieving the metric goal, the contributions to the metric of ISS life support items as required for a Mars mission have been identified and sorted by size. Options for dramatically reducing the larger contributions have been identified. In this way, significant improvements might be achieved,. Although the implementation of such achievements is not identified through this process, this approach does identify where development effort is needed, and the magnitude of improvement that could be achieved.

The use of statistical management techniques is being rediscovered by American business executives. These techniques, developed in the 1920’s, were introduced to Japanese managers in 1950 by an American statistician, Dr. W. Edwards Deming, and Japanese manufacturers credit Deming for much of their productivity and quality improvement success. The control chart is one of the most powerful statistical tools for control of processes. It provides a method of timely, direct communication with a process and allows an accurate assessment of process stability and capability to meet end product requirements. Businesses currently using control charts report direct productivity/quality improvements.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has twice mandated air bag warning labels. This paper reviews and analyzes NHTSA's activities in both the 1993 and 1996 rulemaking procedures against the framework of the available human factors engineering (HFE) and warning literature. It utilizes the full record of the rulemaking process including Federal Register notices and docket submissions to identify the analyses and decisions made by the agency in developing these rules. This analysis concludes that in both the 1993 and 1996 rulemaking procedures, NHTSA developed labeling requirements that appropriately addressed the respective injury prevention policies and strategies of those timeframes. In most regards, the agency properly identified and responded to HFE criteria although some methodological improvements could be obtained.

In a previous SAE paper (2001-01-0046), the authors reviewed the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's (NHTSA) activities in the development of mandatory air bag warnings and analyzed those activities against the framework of the available human factors engineering (HFE) and warning literature. That analysis concluded that in both rulemaking procedures, NHTSA developed labeling requirements that appropriately addressed the respective injury prevention policies and strategies of those respective timeframes. In most regards, the agency properly identified and responded to HFE criteria although some methodological improvement could be obtained. Since the previous paper, the rulemaking process has continued and there have been significant changes to the mandatory air bag warnings. Some of these changes reflect the improvements in advanced air bag technologies.

As of January, 1986, 19 states have approved mandatory safety belt use laws (MUL). Significant controversy has accompanied these legislative activities regarding the safety benefits of MUL versus the imposition of governmental regulation on personal choice. The purpose of this paper is to present a description of operational experiences of MUL in the U.S. Emphasis is placed on quantitative evidence of the effectiveness of MUL and the potential benefit of such laws in the state of Arizona. It is recognized that the public and its legislative representatives must deal with a wide range of issues associated with MUL. However, operational experiences should be considered heavily in the decision-making process. MULs have been effective in increasing safety belt use. However, without enforcement and public education, declining use rates can be expected. Preliminary estimates indicate that significant reductions in fatalities and serious injuries can be attributed to seat belt laws.

Basilar skull fractures comprise a broad category of injuries that have been attributed to a variety of causal mechanisms including mandibular impacts. The objective of this work is to develop an understanding of the biomechanical mechanisms that result in basilar skull fractures when the head is subject to a mandibular impact. In the characterization of the injury mechanism, two experimental studies have been performed. The first study evaluated the tolerance of the mandible subject to midsymphysis loading on the mental protuberance (chin). Five dynamic impacts using a vertical drop track and one quasi-static test in a servo-hydraulic test frame have been performed. Impact surfaces were varied to assess the influence of loading rate. The mean mandibular fracture tolerance among the six tests was 5270 ± 930 N and appears insensitive to loading rate. In each test, clinically relevant mandibular fractures were produced. No basilar skull fractures were observed.

In two experiments, strategic conflict avoidance maneuvers of 32 licensed pilots were analyzed when they flew a series of missions in a low fidelity (Experiment 1) and a high fidelity (Experiment 2) flight simulator, rendering an outside view and a cockpit display of traffic information. On various legs of the mission, aircraft generating traffic conflicts intruded from above, below and at the same altitude as ownship at various azimuth orientations. Pilot maneuvers were categorized in terms of the dimension of maneuver (vertical, lateral, airspeed), and the direction of change within that maneuver. Decision analysis revealed a strong tendency of pilots to use simple one dimensional maneuvers, and of these, to prefer vertical over lateral and airspeed maneuvers. Airspeed maneuvers in particular were avoided.

The requirement of the start of the internal combustion engine (ICE) not only at vehicle standstill is new for full hybrid electric vehicles in comparison to conventional vehicles. However, the customer will not accept any deterioration with respect to dynamics and comfort. ICE-starting-systems and -strategies have to be designed to meet those demands. Within this research, a method was developed which allows a reproducible maneuver-based analysis of ICE-starts. In the first step, a maneuver catalogue including a customer-oriented maneuver program with appropriate analysis criteria was defined. Afterwards, the maneuvers were implemented and verified in a special test bench environment. Based on the method, two sample hybrid vehicles were benchmarked according to the maneuver catalogue. The benchmarking results demonstrate important dependencies between the criteria-based assessment of ICE-starts and the embedded ICE-starting-system and -strategy.

The increasing numbers of hybrid electric and full electric vehicle models currently in the market or in the pipeline of automotive OEMs require creative testing mechanisms to drive down development costs and optimize the efficiency of these vehicles. In this paper, such a testing mechanism that has been successfully implemented at the US Environmental Protection Agency National Vehicle and Fuel Emissions Laboratory (EPA NVFEL) is described. In this testing scheme, the units-under-test consist of a battery pack and its associated battery management system (BMS). The remaining subsystems, components, and environment of the vehicle are virtual and modeled in high fidelity.

Four-wheel drive vehicles have recently become widely used for their enhanced safety in a variety of road conditions on the highway and snowy, wet, and gravel-covered roads. It is well known that four-wheel drive vehicles are superior in maneuverability to two-wheel drive vehicles. We have attempted to explain this superiority by theoretical as well as experimental methods. This paper deals with the theoretical approach in determining the difference in movements between two-wheel and four-wheel drive vehicles during cornering with varying tire-to-road-surface friction coefficients and wheel loads. Experiments were carried out on paved and snowy roads using the two types of vehicles. As a result, it has been verified quantitatively that the four-wheel drive vehicle provides higher stability with greater variations in friction coefficients and wheel loads, though the difference is only marginal under a steady state.

This paper is concerned with an adjustable scale model capable of tracing maneuverability patterns of trailer trains. The transient kinematic paths of a multiple unit carrier of train configuration consisting of ten cargo units provided with conventional two wheel steering, conventional four wheel steering, and modified four wheel steering with a steering ratio and delayed steering action are investigated and discussed.

The orbit maneuvering engines provide the propulsive thrust to increase or decrease the velocity of the space shuttle orbiter while in earth orbit. The design and operational philosophy of the shuttle vehicle and orbital maneuvering system are discussed along with the design characteristic and selection rational for the current baseline orbit maneuvering system. The need for long life and economic reusability are the new shuttle requirements which must be considered along with traditional factors such as performance, reliability, and weight. Critical development issues and potential alternate designs are also discussed.

The need for increased maneuverability has its genesis from the first aerial combat engagement when two adversaries entangled themselves in a deadly aerial dance trying to gain the advantage over the other. It has only been in the past two decades that technologies have been investigated to increase aircraft control at maneuver attitudes that are typically dominated by highly separated flows. These separated flow regions are aggravated by advanced fighter aircraft shapes required to defeat an electronic enemy. This paper discusses passive and active devices that can be used to enhance the maneuverability of advanced fighter aircraft through vortex flow control, boundary layer control, and innovative flow manipulation.

Missions envisioned for micro air vehicles may require a high degree of autonomy to operate in unknown environments. As such, vision is a critical technology for mission capability. This paper discusses an autopilot that uses vision coupled with GPS and altitude sensors. One use of vision processing analyzes a horizon to estimate roll and pitch information. Another use tracks a feature point to estimate position relative to a target. This paper presents examples of waypoint navigation and homing using vision-based feedback. The examples indicate the vision provides sufficient information to achieve the missions.

A manganese fuel additive, MMT, is now being used in many unleaded gasolines to improve their octane quality. Use of MMT at concentrations up to 0.033 g Mn/ℓ (0.125 g Mn/gal) is expected to increase. To determine the effect of MMT on exhaust emission control systems, five cars were tested for 80 000 km (50,000 miles) using a driving schedule which included 113 km/h (70 mph) steady speed driving. In this type of operation, use of MMT caused: plugging of monolithic converters located close to the exhaust manifold; partial plugging of an underfloor bead converter; an increase of hydrocarbon emissions from the engines; and excessive spark plug deposits. However, use of MMT apparently enhanced catalytic converter oxidizing activity and did not substantially affect octane requirement increase. These preliminary data suggest that use of MMT in commercial gasolines may cause problems with exhaust emission control systems now in use.

A test program was conducted with a carbureted 2.3-liter engine in which a map of engine operating conditions over which intake manifold wall films of appreciable magnitude exist was defined on the basis of visual observations. It was found that the largest maldistributions of fuel/air ratio among the four cylinders of the engine occurred during operation at conditions characterized by the presence of extensive fuel puddles on the intake manifold floor. However, it was also found that while the intake manifold fuel films and puddles could essentially be eliminated by heating the manifold floor, the fuel/air ratio distributions among cylinders under such conditions were virtually identical to those measured under conventional operating conditions.

The effect of an active flow control method is investigated on a 1:4 scale realistic vehicle model called “DrivAer” with notchback geometry. The wind tunnel experiments are conducted at a Reynolds number of Re=3.0·106. Fluidic oscillators are applied at the c-pillars and at the upper rear edge of the window. The actuators are installed inside the hollow designed model emitting a high frequency sweeping jet. The spacing of the actuators, the mass flow rate, and the position of actuation are varied. The effect of the active flow control on the car is investigated with force and surface pressure measurements. The surface trace pattern is visualized with tufts for the active flow control cases and the baseline case. A tuft algorithm analyzes provides statistical data of the flow angles. Moreover, particle image velocimetry measurements are performed in the plane of symmetry for β=0° to capture the flow field at the rear end and the wake.