Elaborated shapes of many car components are the reason for which the use of casting techniques to fabricate them is a solution wellfounded
from the economical point of view. Currently applicable regulatory requirements concerning emissions of exhaust fumes force the
carmakers to reduce the overall weight of their products, as this is a basic precondition for reducing fuel consumption. As a result, newly
launched car models contain a continuously increasing share of thin-walled castings made of materials which ensure a satisfactory level of
service properties. At the same time, developing new technological processes allowing to extend the service life of individual components
by means of surface improving becomes more and more important.
The paper presents a method for wireless measurement of car wheel air pressure and temperature using the Tire Pressure Monitoring System, or TPMS module - one of the latest safety systems introduced by the automotive industry - with readings taken on a specifically designed test bench. The paper describes the structure and operating principle of the test bench key elements and how they work with the sensors, the TPMS module, and reference instruments, as well as the data format and accuracy of data transmission between TPMS and the host computer. The software designed for an embedded system emulating the real on-board computer allows for observing raw sensor readings and the effect of calibration in two points of the characteristics.
The article outlines the history of Polish automotive magazines and, additionally, the results of the author’s latest research. The accumulation of hitherto unknown facts and new findings have made it necessary to revise the received view of the subject. So, for instance, the first Polish automotive magazine to be published was Gazeta Automobilowa. It was launched in Lwów in February 1911, five months earlier than Lotnik i Automobilista, until recently believed to be the first Polish car magazine. The article contains an updated, most comprehensive list of Polish automotive periodicals that appeared in print until 1939.
Silicon – molybdenum cast iron commonly called SiMo due to its unique properties has becoming more and more interesting engineering material. The history and development of this alloy is relatively long but, due to the significant difficulties during the manufacturing process resulting in the lower final quality than expected, it has not been applied to often in practice. The biggest challenge is its brittleness as a result of the carbides precipitations. During last few years, thanks to the many important researches made and the general foundry technology development, the interest in SiMo iron has been rapidly growing, especially for the castings for heavy duty applications like corrosion, high temperature and wear abrasion resistant parts. In the article the heat treatment attempts to improve the microstructure of SiMo castings has been presented. The goal was to destroy or at least to refine and uniformly distribute the carbides precipitations to improve mechanical properties of the exhaust manifold castings for the cars. The experiments were carried out for the alloy contains approx. 4% Si, 1% Mo and 3.2%C. The range of the research included: hardness measuring, standard mechanical properties and microstructure for as-cast state and after that the subsequent heat treatment process with another properties check. The result of the heat treatment was the elimination of pearlite from the metal matrix. Moreover, the changes of the carbide molybdenum – rich phase morphology were observed. The dispersion of the carbides precipitations in the carbides area was observed. The experiments proved the possibility to control the microstructure and the mechanical properties of the SiMo castings by means of heat treatment but only to some extent.
The implementation of milk-run in Indonesia has been started since 2005. As a developing
country, there is a challenge to operate milk-run smoothly especially in urban area due to
severe traffic congestion and unfavourable road condition in some areas. This research aimed
to analyze the practice of milk-run operation in one of the biggest Japanese automotive
companies in Indonesia. Transportation Value Stream Mapping (TVSM) is applied in order
to perform just-in-time delivery in the supply chain before operating milk-run. It is discussed
that this company still need to continue in improving milk-run operation. The operation
system needs control and integration from manufacturer, supplier and logistics partner.
The advantage of milk-run operation is cost reduction and also support green logistics in
decreasing emission of carbondioxide (CO2) by reducing the number of trucks used.
The article presents possible ways of development of decision-making processes in autonomous vehicles. The highest degree of autonomy means that it is not the driver but the system, machine or artificial intelligence that makes decisions about road activities. The total autonomy of vehicles gives them predictability, limits the number of accidents they cause, but also highlights the need to develop an ethical system that artificial intelligence will be able to refer to in a critical situation. It is not possible to foresee all the situations that will occur on the roads, so it is necessary to create robot- -human rights that will be a new and binding kind of decalogue. The key issue is that robotic-human rights should be universal, transparent and really applicable to everyone, otherwise there will be chaos on the road and the expected decrease of the number of accidents due to the introduction of autonomous vehicles will not come to pass.
Corrosion is a main problem for longtime exploration of heat exchangers in automotive industry. Proper selection of accelerated corrosion test for newly developed material is a key aspect for aluminum industry. The selection of material based on corrosion test includes test duration, chemical spray composition, temperature and number of cycles. The paper present comparison of old and newly developed accelerated corrosion tests for testing automotive heat exchanger. The accelerated test results are comprised with heat exchanger taken from market after life cycle.