This paper deals with an automated computer-aided process planning and die design system by which designer can determine operation sequences even if they have a little experience in process planning and die design for axisymmetric products. An attempt is made to link programs incorporating a number of expert design rules with the process variables obtained by commercial FEM softwares, DEFORM and ANSYS, to form a useful package. The system is composed of four main modules. The process planning and the die design modules consider several factors, such as the complexities of preform geometry, punch and die profiles, specifications of available multi former, and the availability of standard parts. They can provide a flexible process based on either the reduction in the number of forming sequences by combining the possible two processes in sequence, or the reduction of deviation of the distribution on the level of the required forming loads by controlling the forming ratios. Especially in die design module an optimal design technique and horizontal split die were investigated for determining appropriate dimensions of components of multi-former die set. It is constructed that the proposed method can be beneficial for improving the tool life of die set at practice.

As mechanical structures are minimized, the demand on micro dies and molds has increased. Machining complex 3D shapes requires fabrication procedures for preparing the electrodes. Micro electrical discharge milling using a simple shape electrode can produce 3D micro structure. In this paper the machining characteristics of micro electrical discharge milling according to depth of cut and capacitance are investigated. The machining time is diminished when simple tool-paths and algorithms for changing the feedrate are applied. But a distorted bottom shape and a tapered wall shape are inevitable after machining. The distorted bottom shape and the taper angle of wall are reduced by finish machining.

This study presents a genetic algorithm-based method for optimizing control parameters in the pressure control of electro-hydraulic pump with variable displacement. Genetic algorithms are general-purpose optimization methods based on natural evolution and genetics and search the optimal control parameters maximizing a measure that evaluates the performance of a system. Four control gains of the PI-PD cascade controller for an electro-hydraulic pressure control system are optimized using a genetic algorithm in the experiment. Optimized gains are confirmed by inspecting the fitness distribution which represents system performance in gain spaces. It is shown that genetic algorithm is an efficient scheme in optimizing control parameters of the pressure control of electro-hydraulic pump with variable displacement.

Recently, necessity and usage of the teleoperation have been increased in various fields from industrial automation to home application. Also, the internet is considered as a strong candidate for the transmission media of signals. However, it has an irregular transmission time delay and causes critical problems such as instability and poor performance. This paper presents a practical internet teleoperation system with a streaming buffer system which makes a variable time delay fixed. Validity of the proposed system is demonstrated by implementing the embedded system on a HILS (hardware in the loop system) which models a two-wheel mobile robot.

The high pressure vessels that are constructed by welding process have many welding lines and most of the leakage defects are occurred on these welding lines. The acoustic emission(AE) technique has adopted to detect the defect location and leakage on welding parts, but the AE signal in leakage are incomplete due to the attenuation, reiteration, instability and limit of defect size. To overcome these troubles, the experiments in this study are conducted to measure the indirect media-propagated AE signal perpendicular to the leakage hole. The AE signals that are acquired from the direct and indirect media are analyzed, and the reliability of the indirect media-propagated AE signal are examined experimentally. By AE signal investigation, this method can be adopted to detect efficiently the leakage in welding parts.

Most tasks of the large vertical or ceiling structures have been carried out by human power. Those tasks require us much operation costs and times, safety devices, etc. So the need of automation for those tasks have been rising. That automation needs a wall-climbing mobile vehicle. Most former researches are things about attachment devices and moving mechanisms. A wall-climbing mobile vehicle must be designed by a method different from the case of the vehicle of the horizontal environment. That is because gravity acts as a negative role on the stability of a wall-climbing vehicle. In this thesis, the particular shape characteristics of a wall-climbing mobile vehicle are derived by the wall-environment modeling. In addition, some design constraints of the permanent magnetic wheel as an attachment device was studied. According to those requirements and constraints, one specific wall-climbing mobile vehicle was designed and some experiments were made on the attachment ability of that vehicle.

The attachment of mobile vehicle is necessary for the automated operation on the inclined or vertical walls of steel structures. Since the vehicle requires attaching devices additionally, its overall efficiency can be reduced by the devices. Therefore, external shapes of mobile vehicles have to be researched to give the effective movement on the vertical face. For the design of mobile vehicle, the guideline has been derived from the modeling of wall-climbing, so that the vehicle should have a specific external shape for vertical movement due to the gravitational force. Hence, some adequate arrangement of attaching device to the mobile vehicle has been presented for the effective movement. In the experiments with four permanent magnetic wheels, a plausible result was achieved as a vertical attaching force of 185.2(N), a friction force of 153.8(N) and a curvature radius of 104m. The mobile vehicle should be modified according to the proposed design guideline, and then it could be applied to a specific operation as an appropriate external shape. Also, Further research is recommended on an optimal posture and a moving method in a specific application, as the attaching force of the vehicle can be affected by its posture.

As over 70% of the total life cycle cost (LCC) of a product is committed at the early design stage, designers are in an important position to substantially reduce the LCC of the products they design by giving due to life cycle implications of their design decisions. During early design stages, there may be competing concepts with dramatic differences. In addition, the detailed information is scarce and decisions must be made quickly. Thus, both the overhead in developing parametric LCC models for a wide range of concepts, and the lack of detailed information make the application of traditional LCC models impractical. A different approach is needed, because a traditional LCC method is to be incorporated in the very early design stages. This paper explores an approximate method for providing the preliminary LCC. Learning algorithms trained to use the known characteristics of existing products might allow the LCC of new products to be approximated quickly during the conceptual design phase without the overhead of defining new LCC models. Artificial neural networks are trained to generalize product attributes and LCC data from pre-existing LCC studies. Then the product designers query the trained artificial model with new high-level product attribute data to quickly obtain an LCC for a new product concept. Foundations for the learning LCC approach are established, and then an application is provided.

A flexible incremental roll forming process has been developed by adopting the advantages of the incremental forming process and the roll forming process: i.e., inherent flexibility of the incremental forming process and continuous bending deformation of the roll forming process. It has an adjustable roll set as a forming tool composed of one upper center roll and two pairs of lower support rolls, which plays a key role during forming process. Through the experiments based on the various combinations of process parameters, it is shown that the incremental roll forming process is so effective as to manufacture various doubly curved sheet metals including concave-convex combination shapes in which there exists a line of inflection. The proposed relationship of the experimental parameters and the radius of curvature of the formed sheet boundary is found to be useful in prediction and control of the final shape.

Pressure ripples yield noise and vibration in hydraulic pipelines, which are inevitably generated by a fluctuation of flow rate in the pump mechanism, and such noise and vibration deteriorate the stability and accuracy of hydraulic systems. To reduce the pressure ripples, accumulator and hydraulic attenuator are normally used.
In this study, parallel pipeline with a bent-axis piston pump is introduced to a hydraulic pipe system as a method for reducing the pressure ripples and using the transfer matrix method, the dynamic characteristics of the pipe system are analysed and compared with experimental results. The results show that the phase interference using parallel pipeline with a bent-axis piston pump is effective to reduce the pressure ripples in the hydraulic pipelines.

The automatic assembly system of micro optical filter is a key technology in the development of optical modules with high functionality. In order to develop an automatic assembly system of optical fiber and filter, we have firstly developed the system and program capable of characterization of 30 ㎛-thick film filters as well as conventional optical filters. Moreover, we have carried out the characterization of optical filter using the developed system and program, and compared experimental results with by conventional handwork. The measurement of optical filters using the present system is faster, more precise and more reliable than those based on the conventional handwork.