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Passenger car equivalents (PCEs) are used in highway capacity analysis to convert a mixed vehicle flow into an equivalent passenger car flow. This calculation is relevant to capacity and level of service determination, lane requirements, and determining the effect of traffic on highway operations. The most recent Highway Capacity Manual 2000 reports PCEs for basic freeway segments according to percent and length of grade and proportion of heavy vehicles. Heavy vehicles are considered to be either of two categories: trucks and buses or RVs. For trucks and buses, PCEs are reported for a typical truck with a weight to power ratio between 76.1 and 90.4 kg/kW (125 and 150 lb/hp). The weight to power ratio is an indicator of vehicle performance. Recent development of vehicle dynamics models make it possible to define PCEs for trucks with a wider variety of weight to power ratios. PCEs were calculated from the relative impact of trucks on traffic density using the simulation model INTEGRATION. The scope of this research was to evaluate PCEs for basic freeway segments for trucks with a broader range of weight to power ratios. Such results should make freeway capacity analysis more accurate for mixed vehicle flow with a non-typical truck population. In addition, the effect of high proportion of trucks, pavement type and condition, truck aerodynamic treatment, number of freeway lanes, truck speed limit, and level of congestion was considered. The calculation of PCEs for multiple truck weight to power ratio populations was not found to be different from single truck weight to power ratio populations. The PCE values were tabulated in a compatible format to that used in the Highway Capacity Manual 2000. / Master of Science

Lengvųjų automobilių negendamumo užtikrinimas garantiniu laikotarpiu viena iš priemonių didinančių konkurencingumą. Nepaisant sukuriamų naujų gamybos technologijų, garantiniu laikotarpiu atsiranda lengvųjų automobilių gedimų. Siekiant įgyvendinti visavertį vartotojų aptarnavimą būtina užtikrinti, kad garantiniu laikotarpiu gedimai būtų šalinami kaip įmanoma greičiau. Tam pasiekti būtina, kad pardavėjai savo sandėliuose turėtų optimalų kiekį atsarginių detalių bei žinodami gedimų tikimybės priklausomybę nuo ridos galėtų atlikti prevencinius darbus gedimams išvengti. Tikimąsi, kad nustačius lengvųjų automobilių gendamumą garantiniu laikotarpiu būtų lengviau optimizuoti garantinio aptarnavimo procesą. Eksperimentinių tyrimų tikslas yra nustatyti lengvųjų automobilių gendamumą garantiniu laikotarpiu. UAB „Sostena“ atliktų tyrimų duomenimis „Renault“ markės lengvųjų automobilių gedimų įvyksta per visą garantinį laikotarpį. Nepatikimiausia garantiniu laikotarpiu yra automobilių važiuoklė. Didžiausia tikimybė, kad automobilio važiuoklės sistemoje bus pastebėta gedimų, yra automobiliui nuvažiavus 40–50 tūkst. kilometrų. Automobilį eksploatuojant iki 10 tūkst. kilometrų tikimybė, kad atsiras gedimų, yra mažiausia. Tyrimais nustatyta, kad beveik penkis kartus rečiau nei važiuoklė yra pažeidžiami automobilių varikliai, elektros bei aušinimo sistemos. / Assurance of reliability in passenger cars during the warranty period is one of the means increasing competitiveness. Although novel manufacturing technologies have been designed recently, there are some possible flaws in passenger cars that can be encountered during the warranty period. Seeking to implement a complete customer attendance it has to be made sure that during the warranty period all the faults should be mended as soon as possible. To attain this objective, first of all, it is necessary that all dealers have an optimum stock of spare parts in their warehouses and secondly, actions designed to prevent faults and failures have to be implemented based on the statistical likelihood for the most common failures to occur. It is hoped that it would be easier to optimize a process of after-sales service if a failure of passenger cars during the warranty period is established. The purpose of the experimental study is to determine a fault/flaw of passenger cars during the warranty period. The findings of research done by Ltd. “Sostena” suggest that failures of “Renault“ passenger cars occur during the whole period of warranty. Chassis was found to be the most unreliable part during the warranty period. The research evidence also indicates that the highest likelihood for the flaws to be noticed in a chassis is after a car has done from 40 to 50 thousand kilometres. The least probability for the flaws to manifest themselves was determined before a passenger car had done 10... [to full text]

Increasing demand for road freight has lead to a widespread adoption of more-productive large freight vehicles (LFVs), such as B-Doubles, by Australia's road freight industry. Individual LFVs have a greater potential to impact traffic efficiency through their greater length and poorer longitudinal performance. However, this is offset to an extent as fewer vehicles are required to perform a given freight task on a tonne-km basis. This research has developed a means of characterising the effects that large freight vehicles have on the performance of an urban arterial corridor managed by signalised intersections. A corridor-level microsimulation model was developed from first principles, which modelled the longitudinal performance of individual vehicles to a greater accuracy than most existing traffic simulation software does. The model was calibrated from traffic counts and GPS-equipped chase car surveys conducted on an urban arterial corridor in Brisbane's southern suburbs. The model was applied to various freight policy and traffic management scenarios, including freight vehicle mode choice, lane utilisation and traffic signal settings; as well as the effectiveness of green time extension for approaching heavy vehicles. Benefits were able to be quantified in terms of reduced travel times and stop rates for both heavy and light vehicles in urban arterial corridors.

The aim of my thesis is to describe the automotive industries of the most significant countries in the Asian region. The whole thesis is focused on passenger cars. The thesis is focused on the following countries: Japan, South Korea, China and India. Another aim is to analyze the impact of selected auto makers from these countries to the European market. One of the aims is also introduction of the future trends in the Asian automotive industry, related to Europe. The last aim is to determinate when the Chinese automaker will belong to the world's car manufacturers.

The thesis is focused on styling a real passenger car Proton Prevé with regard to the quality of surface modelling using computer software Autodesk Alias. The stylistic adjustments were made on basis of the background research and poll focused on the target group. Selected body parts have been modified according to the desired sport character of the car and the current vehicle’s appearance. The result of the work is a surface model, which was created using A-Class modelling methods under the direction of Evektor company. The benefit of the thesis is facelift of an existing car with consideration of the current market situation and customer requirements.

This work deals with design of urban electric car. Its analytic part describes the evolution of design of the vehicle and then compares technical options and visual appearance of current production. The main goal of the work is to create an exterior design of compact four-seated electric car intended mainly for urban and suburban passenger transport. This part of the work describes own design solution connecting the aesthetics, functionality, ergonomics and modern technology together.

The life cycle analysis compares the environmental impacts of catalytic converters and the effects of not using these devices. To environmentally evaluate the catalytic converter, the emissions during extraction, processing, use of the product are considered. All relevant materials and energy supplies are evaluated for the catalytic converter. The goal of this life cycle is to compare the pollutants of a car with and without a catalytic converter. Pollutants examined are carbon monoxide (CO), carbon dioxide (CO2), hydrocarbons (HC), and nitrogen oxides (NOx). The main finding is that even considering materials and processing, a catalytic converter decreases the CO, HC and NOx pollutant emissions. The CO2 emissions are increased with a catalytic converter, but this increase is small relative to the overall CO2 emissions. The majority of catalytic converter pollutants are caused by the use phase, not extraction or processing. The life cycle analysis indicates that a catalytic converter decreases damage to human health by almost half, and the ecosystem quality damage is decreased by more than half. There is no damage to resources without a converter, as there are no materials or energy required; the damages with a converter are so small that they are not a significant factor. Overall, catalytic converters can be seen as worthwhile environmental products when considering short term effects like human health effects of smog, which are their design intent. If broader environmental perspectives that include climate change are considered, then the benefits depend on the weighting of these different environmental impacts. / Master of Science

Este trabalho visa avaliar o impacto de veículos pesados na qualidade de serviço de rodovias de pista dupla através de equivalentes veiculares. Para isso, foram feitas estimativas dos fatores de equivalência veicular em rodovias paulistas de pista dupla, com três ou mais faixas de tráfego em cada sentido. Essas estimativas foram obtidas a partir de dados empíricos coletados separadamente para cada faixa de tráfego, em intervalos de curta duração (5 ou 6 minutos). Foram utilizadas 53.655 observações, coletadas em oito estações de monitoramento, nos anos 2010 e 2011. O fator de equivalência foi calculado para cada intervalo através de uma equação obtida a partir do método de Huber, admitindo-se que a qualidade de serviço é a mesma para todas as faixas de tráfego naquele intervalo. Foi considerado como fluxo básico o da faixa da esquerda, nos intervalos em que são detectados apenas automóveis, e fluxo misto o da faixa da direita, em que passam automóveis e caminhões. Os resultados sugerem que: (1) em uma parte signicativa do tempo (52%), a qualidade de serviço não é a mesma em todas as faixas da rodovia; (2) o impacto marginal dos caminhões decresce à medida que a porcentagem de caminhões na corrente aumenta; e (3) as diferenças que existem no fator de equivalência em função do nível de serviço são menos evidentes em rampas mais íngremes, onde o efeito das limitações de desempenho dos caminhões é mais notado. A comparação deste estudo com outras duas pesquisas, em que foram utilizados dados gerados em simuladores de tráfego para estimar os fatores de equivalência, mostrou que as estimativas dos equivalentes veiculares obtidos usando dados empíricos são consistentemente maiores que as obtidas através de simulação. / The objective of this study is to evaluate the impact of heavy vehicles on the quality of service on Brazilian expressways (freeways and divided multilane highways), using passenger-car equivalents (PCEs) for heavy vehicles (trucks and buses). PCE estimates for expressways with three or more traffic lanes in each direction were obtained using traffic data collected over short time intervals (5 or 6 minutes) on expressways in the state of São Paulo. A total of 53,655 speed-flow observations, made at eight permanent trac sensor installations during 2010 and 2011, were used in this study. A PCE estimate was calculated for each time interval, using an equation derived from Huber\'s method, based on the assumption that the quality of service is the same across all traffic lanes during the time interval over which the traffic data is collected. Basic flow (passenger cars only) was assumed to be the observed traffic flow on the lane closest to the median, whereas mixed flow (passenger cars and heavy vehicles) was assumed to be the observed traffic flow on the lane closest to the shoulder. The results indicate that: (1) in a signicant portion of the time (52% of the observations) the quality of service is not the same across all traffic lanes; (2) the marginal impact of heavy vehicles decreases as the fraction of heavy vehicles in the traffic stream increases; and (3) the variations in PCE estimates due to the level of service are less evident on steeper grades, where the effect of heavy vehicles\' poorer performance is greater. PCE estimates obtained in this study were compared with PCEs obtained using simulation. The results indicate that PCE from empirical data are consistently higher than those estimated from simulation results.