Effect of Fiber Orientation on Nonlinear Damping and Internal Microdeformation in Short-Fiber-Reinforced Natural Rubber

Experimental Techniques - Nonlinear damping with respect to vibration amplitude is particularly important in mechanical dynamics. The addition of short fibers to damping materials is considered to...     

The quality of high pressure-induced and heat-induced yuzu marmalade

Yuzu is a typical Japanese citrus with a desirable smell. The objectives of this study are to establish a process for pressure-induced marmalade (without both heating or the addition of pectin) and compare it with heat-induced marmalade. Sliced peel (flavedo) was soaked in 2% citric acid solution (pH 2.0). Albedo, endocarp and juice sacs were homogenized with 0.3% citric acid solution (pH 2.5). After soaking for 24 h, these were mixed and 50% or 60% sucrose of the total weight was added, then pressurized at 500 MPa or boiled (process A). Process B: all processing was done at pH 2.7. Peel of high pressure-induced marmalade maintained a natural color. Flavedo in heat-induced marmalade was softer than that of pressure-induced marmalade. There was no difference in viscosity between heat-induced and high pressure-induced marmalade. High pressure-induced marmalade with 50% sugar was preferred by a sensory test because fresh flavor and color were maintained.     

Hopf Bifurcation in Viscous Incompressible Flow Down an Inclined Plane

We provide the Hopf bifurcation theorem, which guarantees the existence of time periodic solution bifurcating from the stationary flow down an inclined plane under certain assumptions on the eigenvalues of the problem obtained by linearization around the stationary flow. Since we reduce the problem to the fixed domain, the inhomogeneous terms of reduced equations and reduced boundary conditions contain the highest derivatives. To deal with these we apply the Lyapunov–Schmidt decomposition directly.     

Synthesis of O‐(2,3‐dihydroxypropyl) cellulose in NaOH/urea aqueous solution: As a precursor for introducing “necklace‐like” structure

O‐(2,3‐dihydroxypropyl) cellulose (DHPC) samples were synthesized by etherification of cellulose with glycidol (GLY) in a NaOH/urea aqueous solution system under different reaction conditions, so that they had different degrees of ether substitution (DS) in both the overall and regional distributions. The characterization was made by NMR spectroscopy in order to clarify the effects of the molar ratio of in‐fed GLY to anhydroglucose unit and of the reaction temperature not only on the total and regional DSs but also on the molar substitution (MS_dhp) for the multireactive dihydroxypropyl group. The evaluation of MS_dhp was performed after complete propionylation of each DHPC sample. Determination of molecular weights was also conducted on the propionylated DHPCs by GPC analysis. As a preliminary extension, butyralization of DHPC was undertaken in aqueous solution by using p‐toluenesulfonic acid as catalyst together with butyraldehyde (BuA). Two‐dimensional NMR (¹H–¹³C gHSQC) spectra measurements revealed that the products contained butyral groups, owing to dehydration‐cyclization between the BuA‐carbonyl and the duplicate hydroxyls in the side chain of DHPC. Such butyral derivatives of cellulose are expected to be a promising functional material parallel or superior to poly(vinyl butyral) available for safety glass interlayers, etc. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Polym. Sci., Part A: Polym. Chem. 2013, 51, 3590–3597     

Kinetic analysis of photopolymerization reaction of lauryl acrylate with a photoinduced chemical reaction calorimeter

Calorimetric studies on kinetics of photopolymerization reactions made previously have been limited by the structures of the calorimeters. This report suggests a thermal-leak type of calorimeter for carrying out kinetic analysis of the photopolymerization reaction. The method was applied to the photopolymerization system consisting of lauryl acrylate and benzoin methyl ether. The results obtained illustrate the utility of this apparatus.     

Development of a high-speed, half-tracked truck with metal-coreless rubber track

A high speed half-tracked truck using a new type of metal-coreless rubber track for traveling and load-carrying both on- and off-road was developed. In this application a conventional embedded-metal rubber track was examined in a first step, and was found to be unsuitable because of its chain-type structure. Then a new type of positive drive metal-coreless rubber track with endless spiral cable reinforcement was developed to meet all of the desired performance, i.e. low driving resistance, low heat build-up due to flexing, low noise, low vibration, light weight, good flexibility, low wear, etc. The development of this track, along with the use of properly matched undercarriage and suspension, has renewed interest in the use of half-tracked trucks. This truck is based on a conventional four-wheel-drive dump truck of two tonnes payload with its rear wheels converted into rubber tracks. Both high mobility off-road and traveling speed faster than 60 km/h on-road are obtained without detracking of the rubber tracks from the undercarriage. Therefore, the truck is capable of transporting its load between on- and off-road without transshipment. An identical driver's license for the same category as the original truck has been granted by the Japanese Ministry of Transportation since 1992. In this paper, the structure of the truck, the metal-coreless rubber track developed especially for high-speed traveling, the test results, and some market applications are reported.