It is well known that thin coatings can provide increased lifetime and reduced energy consumption for tools and components. During use, e.g. in sliding contact, mechanical and chemical reactions often lead to the formation of new surface layers, tribofilms, possessing different properties compared to the original surface, hence affecting the overall performance. In this work, analytical electron microscopy was applied to investigate the structure and composition of tribofilms. Concerning coatings, deposition parameter dependencies, stability and tribology were investigated. The carbon content of hydrogen-free TiCx coatings was shown to significantly influence the morphology. Low carbon content resulted in columnar grains with a strong texture while high carbon content led to the formation of randomly ordered TiCx crystals. The application of positive bias to the substrate as opposed to the normally used negative bias gave a fibrous structure of sputtered TiB2 and low residual stress with maintained hardness. Further, oxidation stability was examined on a (Ta,Al)C:C coating where oxidation led to partial oxidation and formation of AlTaO4 with an 8 nm interface. A focused ion beam instrument was used to extract samples from certain areas of worn specimens. Tribological contact was observed to result in phase changes and intermixing of materials present in the contact. Sliding contact involving a Co-alloy led to a phase change from fcc to hcp. A 30 nm Co-rich tribofilm was observed with basal planes parallel to the surface. Fully formulated oil was found to inflict considerable wear to a metal doped carbon film through chemical reaction with the metal dopant. WC/Co cemented carbide used for rock drilling exhibited intermixing of rock and Co binder phase after field tests. Chemical vapour deposited diamond worn in nitrogen and argon showed formation of wear debris with amorphous structure containing nitrogen and graphitic like structure, respectively.

The aim of this thesis is to investigate the influence of ageing process on the microstructure and mechanical properties of aluminium-silicon alloys. The investigation was carried on Al-9%Si-3%Cu and Al-9%Si-0.4%Mg. To obtain different DAS with low content of oxide films and micro shrinkage, gradient solidification has been used. The specimens were treated according to T6 heat treatment. In this thesis it has been shown that solidification rate has great influence on mechanical properties since it controls microstructure. To reach peak level of mechanical properties different times of artificial ageing were used depending on the alloy. In peak value condition Yield’s Strength of alloys was 197MPa for Al-Si-Cu alloy and 243MPa for Al-Si-Mg one. These results can be compared to these presented in other papers concerning aluminium silicon alloys. Such comparison shows that when talking about potential of alloy, these results are more or less the same as in other articles in this field. The work was conducted within 10 weeks and for this reason not all the necessary data was collected. Further work will be conducted to obtain missing results, like overaged state for Al-Si-Cu alloy.

In the last few years people have become more and more aware of how humanity is affecting the climate. In the direction of reducing the greenhouse gases is to design engines with higher tensile properties and reduced weight, in order to achieve lower fuel consumption and cleaner fuel incineration in today's truck engines. In order to achieve these requirements it’s necessary to increase the combustion pressure in the engine. This requires higher tensile properties and high thermal conductivity of the engine material. The department of Component Technology at the University of Jönköping in collaboration with Volvo Powertrain AB, Scania CV AB and DAROS Piston Rings AB has been commissioned to develop this material and to find knowledge of material properties used in truck engines and piston rings used for marine applications. The purpose with this work is to analyze the tensile properties of a series of cast iron, cast under different metallurgical conditions. Four different series of cast irons have been analyzed from four points of view, carbon concentration, nodularity, amount inoculation and cooling rate. After the tensile test all specimen data was analyzed in a mathematic calculation program called Matlab 2006a. These results were plotted in different diagrams to show the relations between the variables. A low carbon contents and high cooling rate result in high tensile properties and vice versa. Also, a high nodularity gives the same result, i.e. high ultimate tensile strength, yield strength and young’s modulus. The experiment which cover different amount of inoculation, shows that Superseed is the most efficient element to increased tensile properties followed by Fe-powder and Fe-C-powder. Lamellar graphite iron has the highest thermal conductivity and vibration damping properties compared to compact graphite iron followed by nodular graphite iron. Researches show that the thermal conductivity increases with slow cooling rate, irrespective of graphite structure. When designing new diesel engines, high tensile properties as well as high thermal conductivity are wanted. Compact cast iron has a compromised quality of these requirements. Higher tensile properties are a higher priority than thermal conductivity when the casting cooling rate is chosen. / Mänskligheten har idag blivit allt mer medveten om vilken påverkan människan har på klimatet. Ett steg i att reducera växthusgaserna är att konstruera motorer med högre hållfasthet och reducerad vikt, detta för att uppnå lägre bränsleförbrukning och renare förbränning i dagens lastbilsmotorer. För att uppnå dessa krav är en lösning att öka kompressionen i motorn. Detta medför högre hållfasthetskrav samt hög värmeledningsförmåga hos materialet i motorerna. Avdelningen för komponentteknologi på Tekniska högskolan i Jönköping har i samarbete med Volvo Powertrain AB, Scania CV AB och DAROS Piston Rings AB fått uppdraget att utveckla ett material med rätt mekaniska egenskaper för att passa i lastbilsmotorer och kolvringar i marina applikationer. Målet med detta examensarbete är att analysera de mekaniska egenskaperna i en serie där gjutjärn gjutets under olika metallurgiska förhållanden. Fyra olika serier av gjutjärn har analyserats med utgångspunkt av variation av kolhalt, nodularitet, mängd ympningsmedel samt svalningshastighet. Efter dragning av samtliga prover analyserades mätdata i Matlab 2006a och resulterade i olika sambandsdiagram. Låg kolhalt samt snabb avsvalning av gjutgodset ger höga hållfasthetsegenskaper och vice versa. En hög nodularitet ger höga hållfasthetsegenskaper gällande brottgrans, sträckgräns och elasticitetsmodulmodul. Från experimenten där olika ympningsmedels påverkan av hållfastheten, har kunnat konstateras att ympningsmedlet Superseed ger de högsta hållfasthetsegenskaperna följt av Fe-pulver och Fe-C-pulver. Värmeledningsförmågan och dämpningsförmågan för vibrationer är bäst i lamellartad grafit följt av kompakt och nodulär grafit. Studier visar att värmeledningsförmågan ökar med långsam svalning, oavsett grafitstruktur. I dagens dieselmotorer eftersträvas både god hållfasthet och god värmeledningsförmåga. En kompromiss av dessa krav är gjutjärn med en kompakt grafitstruktur. Högre hållfasthet bör prioriteras före bättre värmeledningsförmåga när val av svalningshastighet för gjutgodset görs.

Simbassängen i Folkhälsocentrum i Laholm har drabbats av skador. Läckage i skvalprännorna har orsakat problem i de övriga konstruktionsdelarna. Laholmskommun har år 2002 vidtagit akuta åtgärder i hopp om att stoppa läckage och förebygga ännu större skador. Reparationsarbetet utfördes och efter två år konstaterades fortsatt läckage.För att kunna bedömma skadornas omfattning och orsak utförs en tillståndsbedömning av befintlig konstruktion. Tillståndsbedömningen kommer att ligga till grund för val av reparationsmetoder och reparationsomfattning. Det största problemet är armeringskorrosion föranled av karbonatisering och kloridinträngning. Hela konstruktionen befinner sig i en väldigt aggressiv miljö som accelererar hela nedbrytningsprocessen. Genom att göra okulärbesiktning och laboratorieanalys har jag kommit fram till att skadorna är omfattande och reparationsarbeten kommer att vara därefter.

Rapporten beskriver ett designprojekt, utfört som en del av examensarbetet på 15 HP, jag utfört som avgångsstudent på möbeldesignprogrammet vid Carl Malmsten Centrum för Träteknik & Design. Från Ronnie Runesson, produktutvecklare på IKEA of Sweden, fick jag ett uppdrag, ett reellt projekt att arbeta med. Projektet handlade om att ta fram ett koncept på en ny typ av arbetsmöbel för ungdomar i åldersgruppen 12 – 18 år. Målet med projektet var att, förutom att leverera ett fungerande koncept till IKEA, sätta min designmetodik på prov med hjälp av ett konkret designprojekt samt att vid projektets slut analysera den. Rapporten har en beskrivande karaktär där jag berättar om de olika etapper arbetet utförts efter: Etapp 1- Koncept- och instuderingsetapp, Etapp 2- Vidareutvecklingsetapp, Etapp 3- Konkretisering av produkt. Beskrivningen förljer en kronologisk ordning för att underlätta läsarens förståelse för designprocessens gång. Rapporten illustreras av ett fyrtiotal bildfigurer som visar delar ur mitt skiss- och gestaltningsarbete. Rapporten avslutas med en analys av projektet samt den designmetodik jag använt mig av. / This report describes a design project (within a graduation project worth 15 points) that I completed during my final year as a student in the furniture design program at the Carl Malmsten Centre for Wood Technology and Design. I received a commission from Ronnie Runesson, product developer at IKEA of Sweden, to develop an actual project to work with. The project was about creating a concept for a new type of desk for adolescences between the ages of 12 and 18. The aim of the project was to, apart from deliver a working concept to IKEA, try out my design methodology with the aid of a concrete design project and at the end of the project create an analysis of it. The character of the report is descriptive and in it I describe the different phases I worked with: Phase 1- Concept and Research Phase, Phase 2- Further Development Phase, Phase 3- Realisation of Product. To facilitate the reader’s understanding of the design process the description follows a chronological order. The report contains some forty images, showing parts of my sketch work. The report ends with an analysis of the project and the design methodology I used.

Abstract The purpose of this research is to investigate the influence of Manganese (Mn) on cast aluminum alloys where a substantial amount of Iron (Fe) is included. Ductility and tensile strength need to be improved in recycled aluminum alloys where greater amounts of Fe are found. Fe is a common impurity and is known to be detrimental to mechanical properties and in order to neutralize the effects of Fe; modifiers such as Mn are added. In this investigation, attempts will be carried out aiming to find the optimal amount of Mn. Other related topics that will be discussed are whether there exists a Mn/Fe ratio which clearly modifies the harmful iron- rich phases and improves the properties for a certain alloy or not. Also, will the heat treatment have a significant effect on mechanical properties? These are some of the questions that will be answered in this paper. It is hard to find research articles that focus only on the influence of Mn on the microstructure and mechanical properties of Al-Si cast alloys. Much of the work that is already published concerns only a specific alloy and casting method. In this work three different casting processes, sand-, die- and high pressure die-casting, will be simulated by using gradient solidification equipment. Furthermore, the influence of heat treatment on the mechanical properties will be examined. The results showed that the solidification rate had the biggest impact on the microstructure and mechanical properties of the alloys, where the fastest cooling rate gave the best results. The effect of Mn seems to influence the samples with coarser microstructures significantly where it had time to modify the Iron-rich needles, also called the β-phase. At higher cooling rates the impact of Mn was impeded. It has been observed that a high content of Mn (around 0.6%) needs to be added before the properties start to improve. UTS (Ultimate Tensile Strength) and YS (Yield Strength) are improved while ductility is lowered. Heat treatment did not seem to have any influence on the effects of Mn.

<p>The aim of this thesis is to investigate the influence of ageing process on the microstructure and mechanical properties of aluminium-silicon alloys. The investigation was carried on Al-9%Si-3%Cu and Al-9%Si-0.4%Mg. To obtain different DAS with low content of oxide films and micro shrinkage, gradient solidification has been used. The specimens were treated according to T6 heat treatment.</p><p>In this thesis it has been shown that solidification rate has great influence on mechanical properties since it controls microstructure. To reach peak level of mechanical properties different times of artificial ageing were used depending on the alloy.</p><p>In peak value condition Yield’s Strength of alloys was 197MPa for Al-Si-Cu alloy and 243MPa for Al-Si-Mg one. These results can be compared to these presented in other papers concerning aluminium silicon alloys. Such comparison shows that when talking about potential of alloy, these results are more or less the same as in other articles in this field.</p><p>The work was conducted within 10 weeks and for this reason not all the necessary data was collected. Further work will be conducted to obtain missing results, like overaged state for Al-Si-Cu alloy.</p>

<p>Abstract</p><p>The purpose of this research is to investigate the influence of Manganese (Mn) on cast aluminum alloys where a substantial amount of Iron (Fe) is included. Ductility and tensile strength need to be improved in recycled aluminum alloys where greater amounts of Fe are found. Fe is a common impurity and is known to be detrimental to mechanical properties and in order to neutralize the effects of Fe; modifiers such as Mn are added. In this investigation, attempts will be carried out aiming to find the optimal amount of Mn. Other related topics that will be discussed are whether there exists a Mn/Fe ratio which clearly modifies the harmful iron- rich phases and improves the properties for a certain alloy or not. Also, will the heat treatment have a significant effect on mechanical properties? These are some of the questions that will be answered in this paper.</p><p>It is hard to find research articles that focus only on the influence of Mn on the microstructure and mechanical properties of Al-Si cast alloys. Much of the work that is already published concerns only a specific alloy and casting method. In this work three different casting processes, sand-, die- and high pressure die-casting, will be simulated by using gradient solidification equipment. Furthermore, the influence of heat treatment on the mechanical properties will be examined.</p><p>The results showed that the solidification rate had the biggest impact on the microstructure and mechanical properties of the alloys, where the fastest cooling rate gave the best results. The effect of Mn seems to influence the samples with coarser microstructures significantly where it had time to modify the Iron-rich needles, also called the β-phase. At higher cooling rates the impact of Mn was impeded. It has been observed that a high content of Mn (around 0.6%) needs to be added before the properties start to improve. UTS (Ultimate Tensile Strength) and YS (Yield Strength) are improved while ductility is lowered. Heat treatment did not seem to have any influence on the effects of Mn.</p>

<p>The mechanical behaviour of coated papers during folding has been investigated. This problem has been studied with experimental techniques and numerical analyses in order to give a better understanding of the folding properties of coated papers pertinent to the mechanical behaviour in general, and particularly cracking along the fold. </p><p>A microscopy investigation has been performed. The surface of the folded paper has been carefully examined to study the event of fracture and related issues. The influence of the grammage on the cracking event has been studied and it was shown that the coating material would not fail if the paper sample was sufficiently thin. It was found that a stress or strain based criterion is sufficient to describe the cracking of the coating layers and that the anisotropy of paper should be taken into account when studying the folding process. </p><p>The finite element method has been used for the numerical analyses remembering that the geometry of the problem is rather complicated, excluding a solution in analytical form. Using different constitutive models for the base stock, it has been shown that the deformation of the coated paper during folding is much governed by the paper substrate. The numerical results also suggested that particular forms of plastic anisotropy can substantially reduce the maximum strain levels in the coating. Furthermore, it has also been shown that delamination buckling, in the present circumstances, has a very small influence on the strain levels in the coating layer subjected to high tensile loading. </p><p>Dynamic effects have also been studied and it has been shown that a quasi-static analysis of the problem is sufficient in order to describe many of the important features related to cracking. An attempt to model strong anisotropy of paper has been presented and the results indicate that the large anisotropy in the thickness direction of coated papers needs to be taken into account in order to fully understand the mechanics of folding. </p><p>Finally, an experimental investigation has been presented in order to study if important mechanical properties of the coating material could be determined by microindentation techniques. The results presented indicate that microindentation can be a powerful tool for characterization of these materials, but only if careful efforts are made in order to account for the influence from plasticity as well as from boundary effects. </p><p><b>KEYWORDS:</b> folding, coated papers, finite element method, cracking, indentation, anisotropy, plasticity.</p>

<p>This thesis work aimed at increasing the knowledge regarding phenomena occurring when gas is injected using a top-blown lance on to a bath. All results are based on physical modeling studies carried out both using low and high gas flow rates and nozzle diameters ranging from 0.8 mm to 3.0 mm. At the low gas flow rates, the penetration depth in the bath was studied. The experiments focused on studying the effect of nozzle diameter, lance height and gas flow rate on the penetration depth. It was found that the penetration depth increases with decreasing nozzle diameter, decreasing lance height and with increasing gas flow rate. The results were also compared with previous work. More specifically, it was studied how the previous published empirical relationships fitted the current experimental data. It was found that the relationships of Banks [1], Davenport [2], Chatterjee [3] and Qian [4] agreed well with the experimental data of this investigation for nozzle diameters of 2.0 mm and 3.0 mm. However, for smaller nozzle diameters there were considerable deviations. Therefore, a new correlation heuristically derived from energy conservation consideration was suggested and showed better agreement for small nozzle diameters.</p><p>The experiments carried out at higher gas flow rates focused on the study of swirl motion. The effects of nozzle diameter, lance height, gas flow rate and aspect ratio on the swirl motion were investigated. The amplitude and period of the swirl as well as the starting time and the damping time of the swirl were determined. The amplitude was found to increase with an increased nozzle diameter and gas flow rate, while the period had a constant value of about 0.5 s for all nozzle diameters, gas flow rates and lance heights. The starting time for the swirl motion was found to decrease with an increased gas flow, while the damping time was found to be independent of gas flow rate, nozzle diameter, lance height and ratio of depth to diameter.</p>