CONSULT LIFT SERVICES LTD
KTP12065 (Completed)
Aug 2020 - Feb 2023 (30 months)
Aim of this project was to embed mechanical engineering & modular design framework expertise, SMART control knowledge and product data management (PDM) to develop a new NPD capability in support of Consult Lift Services (CLS) strategic ambition to become an OEM/lift manufacturer.
The scale and complexity of designing and developing this new goods lift was substantial. Throughout this project Knowledge Transfer Associate (KTA and UWS academic team have delivered i) Feasibility of belt drives for goods lifts ii) Exploring suitable type of motors for this application iii) intelligent lift control model representation iv) Designing a flexible framework for populating goods lift structure using Solidworks v) Reviewing existing Goods lift structures, capabilities and standards vi) CAD design, Design calculations and FEA model iterations (~500 to 600 cycles) and validations/comparisons (Design calculations v/s Solidworks FEA v/s Creo FEA) for four major sub-systems (Sling, Guide structure, Shaft, Motor brackets with counter weight).
J.G.B Steelcraft (UK) Limited
KTP1011822 (Ongoing)
Jan 2025 - May 2027 (30 months)
The KTP seeks to develop a new COR-TEN(c) cladding and roofing system design, utilising advanced new product design and development (NPDD) tools and methodologies to digitise, streamline and automate JGB's current project estimating and design processes; an investment which is central to delivering management's strategic vision.
eACCESS
EU Erasmus+ (Completed)
Nov 2019 - Nov 2023 - 48 months
eAccess is an Erasmus+ project co-financed by the European Union, coordinated by Lodz University of Technology and developed by a consortium made up of 8 institutions from Europe and Asia (Butan, Greece, Indonesia, Nepal, Poland, and Scotland). This international cooperation alliance aims to develop and modernise Undergraduate and Post-graduate curriculum in Power and Electrical Engineering for partner Asian universities. This project will fill knowledge and skill deficit in the area of modern power system of the identified countries through knowledge dissemination, skill development and capacity building.
Remanufacture Strategy for street lamp aluminium castings
Sottish Institute of Remanufacture (Completed)
Nov 2016 - Nov 2018
The research team (Vichare, Olabi, Marzano) investigated and developed a large-scale remanufacturing process for replacing sodium lamps in existing street-light housings with LED lights. Underpinning research included investigation of a chemical-stripping process for aluminium alloy housings with polyester-based powder coatings. The ground-breaking research including life-cycle assessment [3.4] has quantified significant chemical waste and associated environmental impact with de-coating process. A re-coating process was developed, which was applied on cleaned light housings without removing their original coating. Re-coating trials were conduct-ed on both i) de-coated castings and ii) cleaned/wiped castings (with existing coating) for com-parison purposes. Following this research, it was concluded that the de-coating process is not re-quired; thereby reducing chemical waste and the associated negative environmental impact.
WSL have stated that: “Re-coating process for existing aluminium light-housings was defi-nitely a turning point for mass refurbishment projects, where we realised that chemical stripping process can be avoided. The similar approach can be applied to other refurbishment cases as well.”
Based on the research and results from remanufacturing process trials, the financial savings for GCC were estimated at £260,000, and the turnover for WSL estimated to be approximately £900,000.
A new remanufacturing process was adopted by WSL, following collaborative research with the company.
Research undertaken in work-study and ergonomic analysis has resulted in a design and fabrication dedicated remanufacturing work-station. Resulting disassembly process time was reduced to an average of 9 minutes from 28 minutes; i.e. c.68% reduction in the processing time.
Novel cultureware for Bone grafting surgical procedures
Reid, S., Cameron, K., Vichare, P., EPSRC – Developing the NanoKick bioreactor to enable tis-sue engineered bone graft and use of metabolomics to identify bone specific drug candidates
UWS research in product design (Coordinated by Dr Parag Vichare) has led to the invention of cultureware capable of harvesting induced nano-vibrations through a bio-reactor for clinical trials. The research supported the team (names of key individuals from 3.1 below), working collaboratively with the team at the University of Glasgow (Dalby), achieving an entirely new discovery within tissue engineering which involves harnessing nano-vibrations for growing surgical bone graft. Prior to this work, it was reported that 1KHz nano-vibrations can stimulate osteogenesis in 2D and 3D cell culture [3.1]. However, rotary/perfusion mechanical bioreactors used in the previous investigative projects were incommodious, as it was difficult to detach individual clinical samples from the cultureware, for clinical procedures. Underpinning product design research [3.1] (injection mould design, mould manufacturability, and mould flow analysis) has shown that the bio-reactor system fitted with an innovative six-well cultureware with toroidal shaped magnets incorporated in the base of each well can be realised and utilised for rapid osteogenesis. The cultureware was produced using an insert type multi-ejection stroke injection moulding technique. The cultureware and thus collagen and mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), all resonated at 1KHz with an amplitude of 30nm, and have produced clinical grade osteogenic-cells.
Inter/multidisciplinary collaborative product development
Gibson, D., Song, S., Vichare, P, Novel microwave plasma sputter (NMPLAS) deposition pro-cess providing high throughput optical coating. Innovate UK; Shanghai-UK industrial challenge programme
Underpinning research (Dr Parag Vichare) on dimensional variation analysis and UWS’s original in-house collaborative product/process development was applied for designing and manufacturing critical opto-mechanical components of the Microwave Plasma Assisted Sputter (MPAS) system. This was in support of the research at the UWS’s Institute of Thin Films, Sensors and Imaging (ITFSI) to develop and patent a unique retrofittable plasma source for as-sisted deposition. This is a high throughput MPAS system for rapid coating processes. Prior to this research, the technological barrier for optical coatings was the limited capacity of com-mercial Electron Beam Deposition (EBD) systems. Therefore, the demand for a high throughput versatile system for optical coatings was evident. This included complex rotating drum sub-assembly with critical tolerances between optical and mechanical components of the system. The resulting MPAS system was designed to support four sputter targets. Industrial trials have shown a fourfold increase in the coating surface area and a sixfold increase in throughput, which has resulted in a sector-leading operative optical coating system.
Standards-Based Digital Twins of Complete Machining Systems
Virtual machining allows simulation of the machining process by realistically representing kinematic, static and dynamic behaviour of the intended machine tools. Using this method, manufacturing-related issues can be brought to light and corrected before the product is physically manufactured. Machining systems utilised in the manufacturing processes are represented in the virtual machining environment, and there is a plethora of commercial virtual machining software used in the industry. Each software system has a different focus and approach towards virtual machining; more than one system may be needed to complete machining verification. Thus, the significant increase in the use of virtual machining systems in the industry has increased the need for information reusability. Substantial time and money has been put into the research of virtual machining systems. However, very little of this research has been deployed within industrial best practice, and its acceptance by the end user remains unclear.
Dr Parag Vichare (UWS) and Dr Guodong Shao (NIST) presents use cases which utilise the novel concept of machining capability profile and the emerging STEP-NC compliant process planning framework for resource allocation. The use cases clearly demonstrate the benefits of using a neutral file format for representing machining capability profiles, as opposed to re-modelling and/or reconfiguring of this information multiple times for different scenarios. This article has shown through the use cases that machining capability profiles are critical for representing recourse information from a kinematic, static and dynamic perspective that commercial software vendors can subsequently use. The impact of this on mainstream manufacturing industry is potentially significant as it will enable a true realisation of interoperability.
Dimensional management for aerospace assemblies
Tolerances within an assembly are defined during the setting of engineering specifications in the design phase. However, during assembly process execution, certain assembly variations arise from the individual components, manufacturing imperfections, material compliance, the means by which they are fastened and the assembly sequence used. The implementation work reported in this article utilises in-process assembly measurement information for predicting dimensional variation of the aero structure assembly process. A framework is exploited in the case study for predicting the dimensional influence of (1) designed tolerances, (2) designed assembly processes and (3) component and sub-assembly level measurement data for revising the assembly sequence if any concessions were issued on manufactured components. Considerable learnings are achieved while managing dimensional variation of in-process aerospace assembly structure. Dimensional variation simulation is found to be overestimating variation spread even after considering compliance of non-rigid components. Thus, in-process measurement data (component and sub-assembly level) has to be integrated in the variation analysis in order to reduce variation spectrum. Case-based scenarios are discussed where design and measurement data can be utilised for estimating dimensional variation of the in-process assembly.