Engineering and Technology Journal

This study is an attempt to provide experimental test data for reactive powder concrete (RPC) beams strengthened by externally bonded carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) in flexure.
The mixing procedure used in this work presents a successful wayto produce RPC with a (cylinder 100 x 200 mm) compressive strength exceeding 110 MPa using heat curing.
Seven singly reinforced RPC beams were investigated, one was the control beam (no CFRP was applied) and six were externally strengthened by CFRP. All beams were of the same cross section, length, internal reinforcement, and of the same concrete mix design and were cured in the same way. The experimental variables considered in the test program include, number of CFRP strip layers (1 layer or 2 layers) and the width of CFRP strip, with and without using external anchorages. The experimental results showed that the ultimate loads are increased up to 64.29 % for the beams strengthened with bonded CFRP sheets and external anchorage with respect to the unstrengthened reinforced concrete beam (control beam). Also, these strengthened beams showed an increase in the first cracking load up to 100 %.On the other hand, there is a lower deflection at corresponding loads than the unstrengthened reinforced concrete beam.

The aim of this paper is to develop a wireless sensor network to measure and analyze energy consumption in buildings and to investigate the bounds of coverage in different building construction materials. The performance of the designed system is evaluated in different indoor channel conditions using both computer simulations and hardware measurements. The basic design elements include current sensors, microcontrollers, and wireless transceivers implemented using GSM/GPRS platform and ZigBee technology. The use of GSM/GPRS platform makes it possible to control or gather information about the system from anywhere just by sending a request using SMS. Many measurements have been done to find the exact limitation of the designed system in terms of coverage and signal strength in the presence of objects of different materials including: cardboard, metal, concrete bricks, wood and corkboard. The results show that the metal represents the worst material in terms of signal strength reduction. At 4m distance between the base station and the sensing node, the loss in signal strength are 15, 20, 21 and 32 dBm when using metal as compared with cardboard, corkboard, wood and concrete bricks respectively.

The main aim of this study is determining the effect of process parameters on surface roughness in two-point incremental sheet metal forming process using the Taguchi method. The experimental plan and analysis were basedon the mixed L18 Taguchi orthogonal array withfour forming parameters, tool radius (r), feed rate (f), stepover (Δz) and type of support (full and partial support) were analyzed andpyramid shape was used (57°) wall angle. The influence of the process parameters has been investigated and optimum forming condition for minimizing the surface roughness is evaluated. The analysis results show that the stepover has the highest effect on the surface roughness and followed by tool radius, feed rate and die.The result shows that the errorof predicted accuracy for the surface roughness is (1.2%).

This work focuses on the preparation of polymer matrix composite specimens by (Hand Lay-Up) method to make bulletproof armor from the unsaturated polyester resin (UP) as a matrix reinforced by Kevlar fibers at different volume fractions with and without (3%) of Al2O3 powder. The tensile test was performed for these composite specimens which include: (modulus of elasticity, tensile strength and elongation percentage), in addition of ballistic test were studied.
The results of this work show that the values of tensile test increase with increasing the volume fraction of fibers. And the values of tensile test of a composite reinforced by kevlar fibers and addition (3%) of Al2O3 powder was less than those composite without addition of Al2O3 powder.
The numerical method based on FEM was used to analysis of the bullet proof armor ballistic test of the composite specimens by finding the values of stresses, strains and deformations.
The numerical results that obtained from the program (ANSYS 14.5) represent the maximum value of stress happened to the composite specimens when reinforced by eight layers of the kevlar, and vice versa to the deformations and strain also the numerical results shown a good agreement with results that were obtained experimentally.
Results of ballistic test of composite specimens show the volume fraction of fibers has an effect on the deformations of the front face and back face of these composite specimens. And the values of the ballistic test for the composite reinforced by kevlar at eight layers give the best values from other each of composite specimens.

Electrical power system has become large and complicated, so it is subjected to sudden changes in load levels. Stability is an important concept which determines the stable operation of the power system.The modern trend is to employ by installing Flexible Alternating Current Transmission System (FACTS) devices in the system for effective utilization of transmission resources.The FACTS devices contribute to the power flow improvement besides, they extend their services in transient stability improvement as well, study and analyze the stability of the system through rotor angle and voltage .The object of this work is to improve the stability of the Iraqi National Super Grid System (INSGS) by using optimal FACTS devices in different optimal locations under fault conditions.Two test systems are studied, the first system is IEEE or WSCC (9-bus bars), and the second system is the Iraqi (400 KV) electrical network 24-bus bars.The load flow program was implemented using the Newton-Raphson method and the numerical solutions of non-linear differential equations are solved using Trapezoidal method.A comparison has been made between five types of FACTS (UPFC, SSSC, TCSC, SVC, STATCOM) at optimal location of the Iraqi grid and (9-bus bars) to get optimal FACTS devices by (voltage stability, rotor angle ).The results obtained showed that the installation of Unified Power Flow Controller (UPFC) is optimal devices for an improvement of the stability by damping the voltage and rotor angle oscillations.

The Controller design is considered as the important part in the IC engines, to get a stable operation which is the main objective for engine generator set, through controlling the throttle angle to get constant engine rotation speed at different load conditions.The Model has been taken from previous research, considering the throttle angle as an input while the output is the rotation speed, then the controllers have been designed to adjust the rotational speed with the help atMatlab and Simulink techniques. Two main types of controllers have been used in this work which are; PID and Fuzzy PD like controllers. The Proportional-Integral-Derivative parameters have been tuned by particle swarm optimization technique and for the first controller and validated by Integral Square Error (ISE), Integral Time Absolute Error (ITAE) and Integral Absolute Error(AE). While, Fuzzy PD like consisted of seven membership function and forty nine rules. Finally, the results showed the superiority of PID based on Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) compared with Fuzzy PD like controller.

The proportions of aggregate directly affect the performance of HMA depending on their shape, texture, and strongly on the gradation.The determination of aggregate proportions depends strongly on the number of aggregate typesto be blended, and the limits of the desired gradation.
In this research, ten samples had been taken from different text books and papers. Each one contains three types of aggregates; coarse, fine, and filler. The samples were solved individually by seven different methods; five of them by graphical method, the sixth method was solved by running MATLAB, and the last method by using Excel sheet. In this research, five graphical methods were applied, and the aim of using them is to find graphically the tentative blending values and then compare their results individually with optimum values which was found from an Excel spreadsheet, and finally selecting the optimum method. For this purpose, more than 210 readings were utilized.
SPSS program was run two times. In the first run, the values of person correlation (r) of method,Balanced-Areas (Rothfuchs), Walace, Equal Distance, Triangular, and Asphalt Institute when correlated with optimum values were 0.973, 0.964, 0.958, 0.953, and 0.869, respectively. In the second SPSS run, the values of samples No.4 and No.10 were removed because they gave zeros readings, the person correlation of Triangular, Balanced-Area, Walace, Equal Distance, and Asphalt Institute methods were 0.972, 0.970, 0.959, 0.952, and 0.869, respectively.
In this research, It has been found that the Equal Distances method would be considered as an accurate, fast, and even easy method, and can be used for any number of aggregate.

The combination of fibers with traditional reinforcement may be a very interesting design solution to achieve more durable and economical structures. In this study, a total of seven slabs; six ultra high performance concrete (UHPC) slabs and one normal strength concrete slab were tested previously by the Author to observe the crack spacing and number of cracks in tension area, crack width and absorbed energy. Four slabs of UHPC with steel fiber of 0.5%, one UHPC slab with 1.1% steel fiber and one slab of UHPC without steel fiber were used in the analysis. For UHPC, the contribution of fibers to cracking in terms of crack width and spacing is significant when the amount of fibers increased. Also, normal strength concrete slabs have longer crack spacing as compared with UHPC members.

An Investigation of estimated Mechanical Properties of AL-Alloys 6061-T6, which is one of the most commonly used in industrial applications, has been established experimentally. A new novel Plasma Peening techniques had been applied to the whole surfaces of the material by CNC-Plasma machine for 48 specimens, and then a new investigation were takeover to figure the amount of change in mechanical properties and estimated fatigue life. It was found that the improvement was showing a nonlinear behavior, according to peening duration time, speed, peening distance, peening number, and amount of effected power on the depth of the material thickness. The major improvement was at medium speed long duration time normal peening distance. Which shows up to 4 times improvements than the other cases. It was found that reducing in elongation of about 25% from references for 1x plasma peening for the most techniques used while a reduction in elongation of 31% for the two time plasma peening, on the other hand increment of 10% in elongation for 2x plasma peening and 5% of the increment for peening with 5kW of plasma power. These results illustrated in both tables and figures. Further study may established for other AL-Alloys to study the effects of plasma peening on it and to find the most effected one of them for the completely nine AL family.

The present work investigates the suitability of utilizing date palm residues in manufacturing wood-based cementitious boards. It also concerns other environment issues like trying to consume the pollutant carbon dioxides in the boards manufacturing process as an accelerated curing method. Two categories of date palm cellulose fiber cement boards were produced and evaluated, (8% and 5% cellulose fiber content by weight). Comparisons were made between the flexural strengths, stiffness and toughness of the produced boards whichfabricated with conventional and different concentrations of CO2 curing (i.e. 0%, 30%, and 100%). This paper is an attempt to fabricate sustainable products- preferably environmentally friendly- that incorporate agriculture waste in Iraq. Analysis results yielded that higher concentration (100%) has significant effects on the performance of the produced boards, particularly in lower fiber/matrix ratio (5%). Lower CO2 concentration; however, were generally comparable to those obtained at 0% concentration (conventional curing). SEM images confirm the matrix densification effect due to CO2 curing.

Reservoir operation forecasting plays an important role in managing water resources systems. Artificial Neural Network (ANN) model was applied for Mosul-Dam reservoir which is located on Tigris River, which the objectives of water resources development and flood control. Feed-forward multi-layer perceptions (MLPs) are used and trained with the back-propagation algorithm, as they have a high capability of data mapping. The data set has a period of 23 years from 1990 to 2012..The Input data were inflow (It), evaporation (Et), rainfall (Rt), reservoir storage (St) and outflow (Ot). The best convergence after more than 1000 trials was achieved for the combination of inflow (It), inflow (It-1), inflow (It-2), evaporation (Et), reservoir storage (St), rainfall (Rt), outflow (Ot-1) and outflow (Ot-2) with error tolerance, learning rate, momentum rate, number of cycles and number of hidden layers as 0.001, 1, 0.9,50000 and 9 respectively. The coefficient of determination (R2) and MAPE were (0.972) and (17.15) respectively. The results of ANN models for the training, testing and validation were compared with the observed data. The predicted values from the neural networks matched the measured values very well. The application of ANN technique and the predicted equation by using the connection weights and the threshold levels, assist the reservoir operation decision and future updating, also it is an important Model for finding the missing data. The ANN technique can accurately predict the monthly Outflow.

Construction materials waste management is the process of implementing a strategy that is capable to reduce construction materials waste to the minimum. This research aims at developing a construction materials waste management system that can serve construction projects at the local construction industry in Iraq in minimizing waste at the execution phase and raising the interest in waste minimization by all participants. Results of a previous research held by the same authors are employed in the developed system as warning thresholds. The system is employed and tested in six under construction projects in Karbala then evaluated by five principal staff members in each project through a questionnaire form. The system proves to be easy to install, data input is smooth, output is reliable, interaction between the user and the system is efficient, results are accurate, integration between the developed system and MS-project is effective, storage management is productive, early warning of waste excess is active, role of the system in reducing the waste is fruitful, and employing the system in the local construction industry is possible.

In this research, an experimental study to evaluate nutrient removal from Al-Rustamiyah wastewater by a moving bed biofilm process was investigated.The moving bed biofilm reactorMBBR consisted of five reactors in series with one anoxic reactor MBBR-1, two aerobic reactor MBBR-2 and MBBR-3, outlet chamber and the flocculation part with dosing unit, that were operated continuously at different loading rates of phosphorus and nitrogen.The MBBR tankswere filled with suspended plastic carriers (AnoxKaldnes K5), with a 50% filling ratio. Under optimum conditions, almost complete nitrification with average ammonium removal efficiency of 82% was achieved.The average phosphorus and total nitrogen removal efficiencies were 76.79% and70%, respectively.

The Academic Theoretical Frameworks and through their rhetoric and implications of their intellectual base are considered an important foundation to build upon them in advancing the academic scientific research in certain jurisdiction, it has emerged the importance of studying these discourses ( frameworks) due to its knowledge connotations that appear directly or indirectly . In order to investigate the nature of their knowledge authorities which were founded by, and then may be adopted as a basis for future complement researches. As it is known that the properties of the scientific knowledge is being accumulated in their general form. This is what has pushed the research to review some models of discourses or frameworks in architectural researches. Due to the fact that the scientific aspects of architecture combines the fields of humanities with their normative discourses and the positive science with their natural theories – as building physics and structure and others.- the research interested in reviewing these discourses that belong to the field of humanities and specifically these research frameworks that studied the realm of Architecture and Religion. Since it is difficult of investigating their knowledge authorities that adopted in that realm compared to those that belong to the field of positivists science or of arguments governed purely mathematical laws. In order to investigate the nature of their knowledge authorities that adopted in these research frameworks or discourses, the research makes a matching between them and the Islamic intellectual knowledge structures, to measure the consistency between them.The research concluded that there are three powers of knowledge authorities in the jurisdiction (Architecture & Religion ) discourses or frameworks that posit the backs of post- graduate students - master's and doctoral degrees – researches, they were the Authority of Rhetoric , Authority of origin, and Authority of Permission, their impact rate varies between the samples that examined in the case study, in addition the research determine the nature of knowledge structures that adopted in these researches. The research has addressed a sample of researchers in the area referred above that accomplished in only one university in Iraq in the department of Architecture ,University of Baghdad due to the given size of the of the space allocated for research.

In the present work, the hydraulic characteristics of flow over triangular broad crested weirs with triangular front or back face have been experimentally studied. The main objective of this research is to obtain empirical equation to estimate the value of the discharge coefficient (Cd) for this kind of weir and determine the factors that affect on it. For this purpose 18 models were constructed with different dimensions made of plexiglass and were tested in a laboratory flume of 6m length, 30cm width and 40cm height. These models divided into two groups, each group consists of 9 models. In the first group 108 experiments were conducted by changing the upper face angle of the weir three times (90°, 120°, 150°), the angle of the triangular front or back face (α) is also changed three times (90°, 120°, 150°), for each model six different discharges were passed. In the second group 54 experiments were carried out on models with a straight face on the front and back (α=180°) with changing the upper face angle (θ) three times (90°, 120°, 150°) and changing the height of the edge of the weir (P) three times ( 20 , 18 , 16 cm), for each model six different discharges were passed. Dimensional analysis was performed to obtain the dimensionless parameters that the discharge coefficient (Cd) depends on it. Results showed that the change in the angle of the triangular front or back face (α) have little effect on the discharge over these weirs, while it was noted that the height of the edge of the weir (P) affects on the discharge coefficient, where (Cd) increased with increasing (P). Also, the upper face angle of the weir (θ) has an effect on the discharge coefficient, where the discharge coefficient increased with decreasing the value of angle (θ). A simple empirical equation was predicted, in terms of the application, for the calculation of the discharge coefficient (Cd) of weirs that used in this study, there was a good agreement between the results obtained from this equation with the experimental results.

The sustainability of cultural heritage assets – especially historic buildings - becomes a vital part which can be utilized in development plans.
Locally, these buildings suffer from negligence, and lack of clear policies to deal with them in development plans. Thus, the research problem represented by There is nocomprehensive framework of the catalyst historic building).To solve the research problem, a comprehensive knowledge base for the catalyst building was established, then utilizing the abstracted framework in analyzing elected urban projects representing different types of historic buildings.
The research shows a differentiation in the intervention types, the catalyst role of the historic buildings and their impact, that related to the value of the historic building, The role itself varies according to the nature of the context, these buildings could be a tool for positive change toward the future, or they could be a tool for continuity of the cultural identity.

The present work aims to study the effect of particles shape and size of copper powder on physical, mechanical properties and wear resistance of copper-13vol%graphite composites prepared by powder metallurgy technique.Spherical and dendritic copper powder particles were used as a matrix besides a mixture of both shapes with three particle size ranges [(25>),(38-45),(53-63)]m. 13vol%graphite powder with a grain size of(63 (≤ was added as reinforcement. All powder mixtures were mixed mechanically for 2 hours. The mixed powders were cold pressed uniaxially at (700Mpa) for 30seconds and sintered at (900 oC) for one hour.
The results showed that the relative density, both electrical and thermal conductivities and compressive strength of dendritic copper composites are higher than those of spherical copper composites, for example, the maximum values for both electrical and thermal conductivities for dendritic copper (53-63)m+13vol%graphite composite were 36.01 (.m)-1, 295.55 W/m.oK respectively, while wear rate of dendritic copper composites was lower than that of spherical copper composites where the minimum value for dendritic copper composites was (1.068×10-9 g/cm) for dendritic copper (53-63)m+13vol%graphite composite. It was found through the results of the present work that relative density, hardness and compressive strength increases with decreasing copper particle size. On the other hand an improvement in wear resistance was found on decreasing the particle size.

The study, which was made during August showed through calculations, that the use of ventilated cavity wall by air with temperature equal to the temperature of the space (about 25.5oC) and within air velocities range(0.0785,0.157,0.282m/s) made a percentage reduction in the cooling load caused by heat gain from the wall by(65.1,70.7,75.7%) compared with the conventional wall. Also the study showed an increase in the cavity thermal resistance with increasing ventilated air velocity and a linear relationship is obtained within the test velocities range.
The experimental results of the study showed that the use of ventilated cavity wall reduced the average temperature of the inner surface of the wall during the day, andthat the amount of reduction was an average(1.45,1.53,1.71oC)during August when compared with the conventional wall and within the test velocities range, as well asthe use of ventilated cavity wall reduced the temperature difference range of the inner surface of the wall during the day and that the amount of reduction was close within therange of testvelocities, the average of reduction ranged between (0.94,1.01oC)during August when compared with the conventional wall .

An Experimental study Conducted for the continuous expansion process of the brass (70/30) tubes by pushing a conical rigid mandrel inside the tube mechanically.
This study included an empirical part throughout the test of (60) tube samples to give a different expanding ratios up to (40%) and almost at semi-cone angle of the mandrel ranging from small, medium and large angles (10°,20° and 30°) in addition to that the samples with different relative thicknesses (0.05, 0.1, 0.15 and 0.2).The theoretical part ensures that for the predicted with relative forming stress that needed to complete the expansion process in addition to the changes in the stresses of the various exposed a wall of the sample tube ,The study included the influence of work hardening property which earns this study has a great importance in how to deal with this property. This study showed a good agreement between both theoretical and practical parts, especially in determining the relative forming stress necessary for the success of the operation that showed the relative forming stress increases as the expansion ratio and the semi-cone angle of the mandrel increases has ranged between (0.1-0.7) of the samples tested. Noting that the formation is influenced by the first was much larger than the second was. Whereas the relative forming stress decrease as the relative thickness increase for the same expansion ratio and the semi-cone angle of the mandrel formation.

With the accelerated pace of urban life and increasing of working hours during the day so the time for most people to enjoy and do their social activities entertainment became at evening hours, so that raise the insistent desire to increase the quality and beauty of the external spaces night scene
Artificial lighting Lead a very important role in the nightscape scene of the landscape, as artistic and designing factor, and had an active presence pass over their physical properties and psychological effects towards the formation of the nightscape final image of the landscape
So the research problem has emerged in the impact of artificial lighting on nightscape figuration elements in the landscape, and so the research hypothesis represents the differences of artificial lighting properties effect on the nightscape figuration elements. Research appointed the most important nightscape figuration vocabulary and extracts their indicators to be measured and then the application of indicators had drawn on a range of global and regional projects, and the result has been proven the impact of artificial lighting through their characteristics on the figuration elements of nightscape.