Nowadays, polymer-metal hybrids are covering a broad range of advanced applications, especially in the automotive or aerospace industries where high performance and lightweight components are highly demanded. Hybrid parts may offer additional functionality regarding strength, durability, impact and wear resistance without sacrificing size or weight of the full component. However, there are still challenges regarding improving the adhesion between dissimilar materials such as metals to polymers and its composites. There is a lack of research about the influence of a post heat treatment on adhesion and durability in polymer-metal hybrids manufactured through an overmolding processing chain. There is also a need for using adhesive promoters that may offer simultaneous corrosion protection to metallic substrates in order to extend the lifecycle of the part when subjected to diverse harsh environments. In this work, two organic coatings used as adhesive promoters on steel substrates were investigated: the first one is a polyester-based powder-coat adhesive developed in the Leibniz-Institute in Dresden. The second one is a high performance anti-corrosive electrophoretic paint that has never been reported in the literature as an intermediate adhesive layer in a thermoplastic-polyurethane (TPU) overmolding processing chain. A TPU was overmolded on both pre-coated steel substrates, and the adhesion of the polymer to the metal substrate was investigated after a heat treatment (annealing), and a subsequent hygrothermal aging at different temperature-humidity conditions. The influence of the annealing process on the adhesion and durability of the multilayered specimen was investigated in depth; similarly, failure modes and lifetimes were evaluated after the hygrothermal aging. Lifetime predictions calculated from kinetic parameters for solid decomposition -obtained from thermogravimetric analysis- were validated experimentally with polyurethane-steel hybrids commonly used as district heat pipes. Adhesion of TPU on the steel substrate using both organic coatings as adhesive promoters was successful due to the contribution of new physical-chemical and mechanical interactions at the polymer-coating interface, especially after annealing at 100 °C for 20 h. Additionally, heat treated hybrids exhibited a much better performance because of the apparent increased in the anchoring density at the polymer-metal interfaces. It is conclusive that progressive failure of the multilayered specimen is strongly dependent on water diffusion rather than thermolysis of any of the components, as it was detected by FTIR, and observed in the micrographs on the artificially-aged hybrid surfaces. Finally, accelerated aging was used to correlate lifetime predictions throughout the analysis of the kinetics of degradation using TGA experiments and mechanical tests. The calculated values of the activation energy evidence that durability of the polyurethane-based polymers is affected by temperature and humidity at the conditions described in this work. Lifecycle is directly related to kinetic parameters, and especially to the activation energy, EA. This kinetic parameter for pre-aged specimens, and particularly for those subjected to higher temperature conditions, were lower when compared to the fresh polymer; as it was demonstrated that TGA analysis is a primary tool to predict lifetime for thermoplastic and thermosetting polyurethanes.

One of the biggest responsibilities of today’s marketing managers is to use their financial and labour resources in the most efficient way. However, any kind of traditional marketing method which is designed and spread by the seller is both costly and less influential on customer’s buying behaviour. Word of Mouth, which can simply be explained as any marketing action that leads to earn customer recommendation, (Word of Mouth Marketing Association) helps organizations to burst their sales revenues while decreasing their marketing budgets. WOM is considered as more transparent, more credible and more relevant by customers. Besides, it is a cheaper way of advertisement for organizations due to its organic spread characteristic. Therefore, marketers should focus on creating strategic marketing actions that will keep WOM effect at the peak level. This research attempts to disprove the common belief that, WOM cannot be controlled by the seller itself. Especially, the effort will be put on Business to Business relationships, which are usually considered more unreactive to WOM communication. In order to achieve that, author will provide a four-step WOM analysis framework to its readers. First, transactions mapping will be utilised to see possible areas of WOM development. Afterwards, WOM actors of the market will be identified and customer decision cycle elements will be disclosed in order to understand the WOM potential of a particular market. Final step of the framework will be the calculation of Customer’s Total Value which is composed of their Lifetime and Referral Values. Research also includes an online survey, whose results are converted to numerical data in order to determine Customers´ Referral Value. In the final part, Telefónica Data/Capacity Services´ customers will be ranked according to their total values and a Customer Value Matrix will be created. Customers will be segmented into four main groups named as Champions, Affluents, Advocates and Misers; all of which have different buying and WOM characteristics. Ultimately, tailored WOM strategies will be advised in order to maximize each group’s total value.

In this paper, a new methodology is presented to estimate the lifetime impact of design changes, called Failure Likelihood Assessment (FLA). The discussion in this paper is on the fatigue lifetime prediction of axial piston units, especially after a design change. The demonstration object is an axial piston pump due to extreme environmental conditions and high specification demands, where the FLA is applied to a manufacturing change in an existing product and delivers an effect on the unit reliability. The resulted reliability imp rovement, if combined with typical calculation methods like Weibull analysis, delivers an increase in predicted lifetime considering the intended modification. As demonstration subje ct, a change of the manufacturing process of the cylinder block hub in an axial piston pump is used. The effect to the lifetime is predicted via the FLA-method and the results are calculated with test data and compared to theoretical results. The paper shows that the methodology delivers highly accurate results providing that the FLA is a powerful tool to analyze design changes as weil as new designs in regard to reliability and lifetime. The benefit for the user of this methodology will hence be more reliable products with optimized designs tobest fulfil customer's performance requirements.

The thermal-oxidative degradation of a crosslinked hydroxy-terminated polybutadiene (HTPB)/cycloaliphatic diisocyanate (H12MDI) based polymer, which is commonly used as a polymeric binder in propellants, is investigated at temperatures from 95°C to 125°C with the aim of estimating the lifetime of the material in storage conditions (20°C) using the Arrhenius approach. Furthermore, the effect of antioxidants and to a lesser extent plasticizer on the degradation process was also studied. Diffusion-limited oxidation (DLO) was theoretically modelled and DLO conditions were estimated by gathering oxygen permeability and consumption data from similar studies. It was concluded that DLO-effects might be present at the highest experiment temperature (125°C) depending on the actual properties of the material investigated. The mechanical degradation was monitored by conducting tensile tests in a DMA apparatus and photographs using a microscope was taken to examine potential DLO effects. The degradation process of the stabilized polymer (with antioxidant) did not showcase Arrhenius behaviour, which was confirmed by the failure to construct a satisfactory mastercurve. This was most likely due to loss of antioxidants, resulting in autocatalytic oxidation(acceleration of the oxidation process). However, the induction period of the stabilized polymer showcased Arrhenius behaviour in the temperature region 95-125°C with an ~E_a = 90 kJ/mol. If the activation energy E_a is assumed to remain constant, the lifetime at ambient temperature (20°C) is predicted to be approximately 176 Years for a 2mm thick sample. However, this is probably an overestimation since curvature in the Arrhenius plot has been observed for many rubber materials in the lower temperature region. Assuming the E_a drops from ~90 kJ/mol to~71 kJ/mol, a more conservative lifetime prediction of 58 Years was estimated.

Certificates are the foundation of secure communication over the internet as of today. While certificates can be issued with long validity periods, there is always a risk of having them compromised during their lifetime. A good practice is therefore to use shorter validity periods. However, this limits the certificate lifetime and gives less flexibility in the timing of certificate replacements. In this thesis, we use publicly available network logs from Rapid7's Project Sonar to provide an overview of the current state of certificate usage behavior. Specifically, we look at the Let's Encrypt mass revocation event in March 2020, where millions of certificates were revoked with just five days notice. In general, we show how this kind of datasets can be used, and as a deeper exploration we analyze certificate validity, lifetime and use of certificates with overlapping validity periods, as well as discuss how our findings relate to industry standard and current security trends. Specifically, we isolate automated certificate services such as Let's Encrypt and cPanel to see how their certificates differ in characteristics from other certificates in general. Based on our findings, we propose a set of rules to help improve the trust in certificate usage and strengthen security online, introducing an Always secure policy aligning certificate validity with revocation time limits in order to replace revocation requirements and overcoming the fact that mobile devices today ignore this very important security feature. To round things off, we provide some ideas for further research based on our findings and what we see possible with datasets such as the one researched in this thesis.

<p> The sales of deer licenses, one of the most important revenue sources for wildlife management at the Indiana Department of Natural Resources (IDNR), have been declining for a decade. To increase its funds, the agency is considering launching a new lifetime deer license, which would allow hunters to harvest deer (and possibly other species) each year for the rest of their lives in exchange for a large, up-front fee. The forward-looking nature of the decision to buy a lifetime license means hunters’ choice behavior is necessarily dynamic. We estimate a dynamic discrete choice model using data from a discrete choice experiment (DCE) to capture this forward-looking choice behavior and to estimate hunters’ preferences for different lifetime license designs. We find that our dynamic model better fits our data than a standard, static choice model. We also find that hunters prefer licenses that allow (i) harvest of antlered and antlerless deer to one that only allows harvest of antlerless deer and (ii) harvest of additional species beyond just deer. We use our model to estimate the price of lifetime licenses that maximizes IDNR revenues. This is the first study to estimate the value of lifetime deer hunting licenses using a dynamic approach. This dynamic approach can help improve the IDNR’s decision-making to maximize its revenue and stabilize wildlife management funds.  </p>

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L’analyse de la durée de vie des joints brasés est un challenge pour les industries du spatiale, de l’aéronautique et de la défense qui ont besoin d’équipements très fiables pour des environnements sévères et de longues durées de vie. L’évolution des technologies de boitier électronique, principalement conduite par les marchés civils, introduit de nouvelles architectures et de nouveaux matériaux dont la fiabilité doit être étudiée pour les exigences de ces marchés critiques. Un des éléments critiques d’une carte électronique est l’interconnexion effectué par le joint brasé. Dans ce contexte, les connaissances des propriétés de fatigue des matériaux utilisés pour le joint brasé sont nécessaires pour développer des cartes électroniques, définir les essais accélérés de qualification ou pour réaliser des simulations de durée de vie.Les lois utilisées communément dans l’industrie sont généralement des critères simplifiés comme les lois de Coffin-Manson, basée sur la déformation inélastique, ou Morrow, basée sur l’énergie dissipée. Les déformations plastique et visqueuse sont dans ces lois indissociées et appelées déformation inélastique, supposant que les contributions au dommage des déformations plastique et visqueuse sont similaires. Cependant, la pertinence de ces lois dans le cas du matériau joint brasé et les profils de mission des marchés critiques doit être étudiée. En effet, le joint brasé possède une température de fusion faible qui entraine un comportement visqueux même à température ambiante. Celle-ci est nécessaire à l’étape d’assemblage des boitiers. Ainsi, d’importantes déformations visqueuses sont développées notamment pour les environnements sévères et les longues phases de maintien de ces marchés critiques. Dans ce contexte, il est important de prendre en compte l’interaction fatigue-fluage dans les matériaux joint brasé pour atteindre les exigences de ces applications.Les limitations de la littérature sont le manque de données expérimentales précises dissociant les déformations plastique et visqueuse en essai de fatigue. La représentativité des éprouvettes massiques par rapport à l’application finales est en effet discutable au vue de la microstructure très spécifique du joint brasé. De plus, il n’existe pas de consensus réel sur les modèles matériaux à utiliser. Dans ce contexte, un banc de mesure a été développé dans le but de réaliser des essais de fatigue en cisaillement sur des boitiers électroniques assemblés.Le temps de maintien, la température et la force appliquée ont un impact sur le nombre de cycles à défaillance. La combinaison d’une augmentation de la température avec l’ajout du temps de maintien réduit jusqu’à un facteur dix le nombre de cycles à rupture. Les courbes d’hystérésis du boitier ont été converties en contrainte et déformations plastique et visqueuse dans le joint brasé dans le but de calibrer un modèle matériau et une loi de fatigue. Les résultats montrent que l’intérêt des lois de fatigue utilisées communément est limité. Des résultats utilisant différents dispositifs expérimentaux de la littérature ont été ajoutés pour compléter ceux trouvés. Une loi de fatigue modifiée en fréquence a été testée et montre de meilleures prédictions dans le cas d’essais réalisés à différentes fréquences car elle permet de prendre des effets liés au temps comme la viscosité. Cependant, des limites avec cette loi ont été trouvées dans le cas de sollicitation avec temps de maintien. Une loi de fatigue prenant en compte l’interaction fatigue fluage a ensuite été proposée avec de bonnes prédictions notamment pour des températures plus élevées. L’évolution de la microstructure a montré que le dommage détruit la structure dendritique du joint et la remplace par des joints de tailles plus petites dans la zone proche de la fissure. La coalescence d’éléments a également été observée. Cependant, plus d’investigations sont nécessaires pour définir les marqueurs spécifiques des dommages plastique et visqueux. / Solder joints reliability analysis represents a challenge for the aerospace and defense industries, which are in need of trustworthy equipment with a long lifetime in harsh environments. The evolution of electronic packages, driven by consumer civil applications, introduces new architectures and materials for which reliability needs to be qualified for the constraints of the aerospace and defense applications. One of the most critical elements of an electronic assembly is the solder joint interconnection. In this context, the knowledge of fatigue properties of solder material is required to design the assemblies, to define accelerated tests or to perform lifetime simulations.Fatigue laws used commonly in the industry are generally simplified criteria such as Coffin-Manson relation, based on inelastic deformation, or Morrow relation, based on dissipated energy per cycle. Cyclic creep and plastic strains are mingled and formulated as a unique inelastic strain in these relationships. The underlying assumption is that damage contributions of creep and plasticity phenomena are equivalent. The relevance of these laws in the case of solder joint and the mission profiles of aerospace and defense industries can be discussed. In fact, solder joint materials have low melting temperatures which are required by the assembly manufacturing process, inducing viscous strains even at room temperature. In this context, important viscous strains are developed due to the harsh environment with high temperatures and the long maintain phases of space, defense and avionics industries. Creep-fatigue interaction must be taken into account for solder joint material in order to address these applications requirements.Limitations of the literature are the lack of clear experimental data separating plastic and creep strains during fatigue tests. Representativeness of experimental tests based on bulk samples can be discussed because of the complex microstructure of solder joints. No consensus exists on the mechanical model and the parameters. In this context, an innovative test bench has been developed to perform shear fatigue tests with assembled electronic packages in order to study creep-fatigue interaction in solder joints.Dwell time, temperature and force have an impact on the number of cycles to failure. Combined increase of temperature and dwell time reduces the number of cycles to failure until a factor of 10. The hysteresis response of the package is converted in stress and plastic and viscous strains in order to calibrate a viscoplastic model and a fatigue law. Results show limitations of classic Coffin-Manson fatigue law. Experimental results from the literature have been used to complete our test plan. A frequency modified fatigue model shows increased prediction accuracy for fatigue tests performed at different frequencies. In fact, time-dependent viscous damage is included in the law by the frequency factor. However, limitations of this law have been found in particular for long dwell time configuration. A creep-fatigue model is proposed to dissociate damages from plastic and viscous strains. This fatigue law increases prediction accuracy in the case of high temperature and long dwell time configuration. Microstructure evolutions indicate the destruction of the dendritic structure and replaced by small grains recrystallization in the area close to the fracture. Coalescence of different precipitates is also observed in the damaged area. More investigations on this topic are required in order to evaluate the specific markers of plastic and viscous damages.

There are three ways to deal with component failure: reactive maintenance, preventive maintenance, and predictive maintenance. Reactive maintenance is to repair only once something breaks. Preventive maintenance is to repair before it breaks, independent of actual wear. Predictive maintenance is performed on the basis of real time operational data, repairing when components cross a certain degradation threshold.  With classification models one can determine the health state of a component. Regression models, on the other hand, allow the user to calculate a more precise estimate of remaining useful life. Previous research on regression models have exclusively used sensory data while classification models have used both sensory data as well as log-data. Research on predictive maintenance using regression models have found most success using SVM regression, decision trees, random forest regression, artificial neural networks and LSTM models.  Companies have more and more data to their disposal about the performance of their machines, but usually in the form of log-data. The goal of this research is to find if it is possible to use log-data for regression models. If this is the case, more sophisticated regression models can be used to apply predictive maintenance more accurately on a broader scale than is currently the case. The project was performed through a case study at a company in the semiconductor industry in the Netherlands, with years of log-data of their product that are gradually degrading over time. After quantifying the log-data and trying all kinds of different regression models in combination with different time scales, the results were unilaterally abysmal and were unable to make any decent prediction.  The reason for this according to several experts in the field of data science is that there was no in depth understanding of the data. They say it is required to have an integral understanding of the log-data and to closely collaborate with field engineers who know the data in and out. If a field engineer can say something about the degradation of a machine using only the log-data, a machine learning model can do it too. If a machine learning model is unable to purposefully overfit on the training data and the results are bad, there is no signal in the dataset and the task is impossible. It does not matter if the data was originally sensory or log-based, the only thing that matters is understanding what the data means and the presence of the degradation signal within.

The aim of this thesis is to describe behavior of cracks in layered polymer materials. Quasi-brittle fracture (through the initiation and subsequent crack propagation mechanism) under low stresses is the most common mode of failure of polymer materials. In this case plastic deformations are localized in the vinicity of the crack tip and linear elastic fracture mechanics description of the crack behavior can be used. The knowledge of fracture parameters change during the crack propagation in multilayer body is a key point for establishing of the maximum load and consequently for the assessment of the residua lifetime. In contrast to homogeneous bodies the estimation of stress intensity factors for multilayer (composite) structure is numerically more elaborated and the fracture mechanics approach is complicated by the existence of interfaces between single layers, where material parameters are changed by a step. Special attention is paid to the configuration of a crack growing close to the material interface and along the interface. For the crack with tip on the material interface the effective values of stress intensity factor based on the crack stability criteria are estimated. It is shown that under special conditions (depending mainly on the elastic mismatch of materials) the existence of material interface has positive influence on the lifetime of the multilayered structure.