Thesis (M. Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 1998. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 57-61).

The 1990's in Victoria saw a political and economical shift away from the social justice themes of previous years to an economic rationalist approach to public sector services. Like other countries, educational reform initiatives focused on the introduction of market-oriented commercial practices. These were characterised by increased accountability for expenditure, pressure to supplement publicly funded income with commercial ventures, rationalisation of staff, privatisation of some services and a business-oriented approach to service provision. As part of this shift TAFE Institutes in Victoria were actively encouraged to embark on a business-based, entrepreneurial approach to training delivery in a competitive, user-choice market. This changing external environment is the context for this 'practitioner research' investigative project - the development of a motorsports program as a case study of innovation and entrepreneurship at Wodonga Institute of TAFE. A participant-observer research approach was applied to examine the perceptions of the stakeholders about the development of the program. Data was collected through semi-formal interviews with stakeholders, maintaining a reflective research journal and reviewing related literature. Analysis of the data identified emergent themes (enabling factors and barriers), reflecting at a micro level, similar themes and issues from current research and debate at national level. The themes are similarly reflected in literature on innovation, organisational change and entrepreneurship. The products generated from the investigative research project are:  Capturing Innovation: Entrepreneurial Activity Within a Publicly Funded Educational Organisation, an exegesis examining innovation and entrepreneurship at Wodonga Institute of TAFE through a case study (the motorsports program)  What a Great Idea! Where to From Here?, a set of guidelines for Wodonga Institute of TAFE practitioners about what is required in presenting their ideas to Senior Management (Appendix 1 and Appendix 2), and  a Professional development workshop agenda to support promotion of the guidelines (Appendix 2)  recommendations to Wodonga Institute of TAFE Directorate (Director/CEO and two Deputy Directors) for supporting the development of innovative ideas (Chapter 6). These outcomes aim to increase the success rate of innovative ideas being captured and developed into training programs and products at Wodonga Institute of TAFE.

Thesis (M.Arch.(Prof))-University of Pretoria, 2005. / Includes summary. Includes bibliography. Available on the Internet via the World Wide Web.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / The use of carbon-fiber reinforced composite materials is not novel in the field of motorsports industry. Their use in collapsible structures for crashworthiness is however not fully understood and predicted. Due to the complex failure mechanisms occurring within the material, the energy absorbing capacity cannot be easily pre dicted. The need to understand their contributions in crashworthy structures is thus of great importance. Furthermore, failure of carbon-fiber composites is highly depen dent on the geometry of structure. Problems arise in both experimental and numerical modelling of these structures. Although many explicit FEA codes exist, they often include experimental parameters that need to be calibrated through either coupon tests or actual crash tests. As composite structures become more commonly used in automotive industry, it is necessary to set some guidelines to successfully model and simulate composite crashworthy structures. The numerical modelling was done in LS-DYNA Enhanced composite damage MAT54. The material properties were configured using experimental coupon tests. The tests were conducted on square composite tubes. The Specific Energy Absorption (SEA) of the tubes were calculated through several coupons. As SEA is a function of geometry, it was necessary to conduct tests with similar geometry as seen in nosecone. MAT54 was chosen to simulate both crush and crash simulations due to its capability to simulate element level crushing. Furthermore, various modifications within the material model, improve its accuracy to determine composite failure. The research utilizes the characterization of material inputs in MAT54 by con ducting quasi-static compression tests on simpler but similar geometry. By utilizing inputs, a zonal optimization was conducted on the nosecone geometry. The number of layers, layer orientations and ply thicknesses were varied to vary the energy absorbed per zone. The deceleration of the vehicle can thus be controlled, and the weight of the structure could be reduced.

M.Comm. / Millions of people around the world watch motor racing on television, and millions of people journey to race circuits to experience personally the excitement and glamour [Howard, 1992: 81]. The ear-splitting noise, the smell of the fuel, the gleaming cars and the drivers - modem-day knights in armour, who do battle at unbelievable speeds. And behind every driver are sponsors, managers, engineers, mechanics and a whole team of professionals. Since cars were invented more than a century ago, men have felt an impulse to race them, while manufacturers have used the sport to prove the superiority of their vehicles.

In recent years, American interest in motorsports has experienced increasing growth as the potential impact of the industry' on state and local economies has been recognized. At the same time, an increasing number of college students have begun to express an interest in career opportunities in the motorsport industry. This paper will provide a first look at the extent of management-oriented career options in motorsports. In addition, a case study of a partnership between a university and motorsport venue, established to support the academic preparation of students interested in a career in the motorsport industry, will be discussed.

published_or_final_version / Environmental Management / Master / Master of Science in Environmental Management

<div>The use of carbon-fiber reinforced composite materials is not novel in the field of motorsports industry. Their use in collapsible structures for crashworthiness is however not fully understood and predicted. Due to the complex failure mechanisms occurring within the material, the energy absorbing capacity cannot be easily predicted. The need to understand their contributions in crashworthy structures is thus of great importance. Furthermore, failure of carbon-fiber composites is highly dependent on the geometry of structure. Problems arise in both experimental and numerical modelling of these structures. Although many explicit FEA codes exist, they often include experimental parameters that need to be calibrated through either coupon tests or actual crash tests. As composite structures become more commonly used in automotive industry, it is necessary to set some guidelines to successfully model and simulate composite crashworthy structures. </div><div><br></div><div>The numerical modelling was done in LS-DYNA Enhanced composite damage MAT54. The material properties were configured using experimental coupon tests. The tests were conducted on square composite tubes. The Specific Energy Absorption (SEA) of the tubes were calculated through several coupons. As SEA is a function of geometry, it was necessary to conduct tests with similar geometry as seen in nosecone. MAT54 was chosen to simulate both crush and crash simulations due to its capability to simulate element level crushing. Furthermore, various modifications within the material model, improve its accuracy to determine composite failure. </div><div><br></div><div>The research utilizes the characterization of material inputs in MAT54 by conducting quasi-static compression tests on simpler but similar geometry. By utilizing inputs, a zonal optimization was conducted on the nosecone geometry. The number of layers, layer orientations and ply thicknesses were varied to vary the energy absorbed per zone. The deceleration of the vehicle can thus be controlled, and the weight of the structure could be reduced.</div>

The efficiency of the mechanical design process can be improved by the use of evolutionary algorithms. Evolutionary algorithms provide a convenient and robust method to search for appropriate design solutions. Difficult non-linear problems are often encountered during the mechanical engineering design process. Solutions to these problems often involve computationally-intensive simulations. Evolutionary algorithms tuned to work with a small number of solution iterations can be used to automate the search for optimal solutions to these problems. An evolutionary algorithm was designed to give reliable results after a few thousand iterations; additionally the scalability and the ease of application to varied problems were considered. Convergence velocity of the algorithm was improved considerably by altering the mutation-based parameters in the algorithm. Much of this performance gain can be attributed to making the magnitude of the mutation and the minimum mutation rates self-adaptive. Three motorsport based design problems were simulated and the evolutionary algorithm was applied to search for appropriate solutions. The first two, a racing-line generator and a suspension kinematics simulation, were investigated to highlight properties of the evolutionary algorithm: reliability; solution representation; determining variable/performance relationships; and multiple objectives were discussed. The last of these problems was the lap-time simulation of a Formula SAE vehicle. This problem was solved with 32 variables, including a number of major conceptual differences. The solution to this optimisation was found to be significantly better than the 2004 UWA Motorsport vehicle, which finished 2nd in the 2005 US competition. A simulated comparison showed the optimised vehicle would score 62 more points (out of 675) in the dynamic events of the Formula SAE competition. Notably the optimised vehicle had a different conceptual design to the actual UWA vehicle. These results can be used to improve the design of future Formula SAE vehicles. The evolutionary algorithm developed here can be used as an automated search procedure for problems where performance solutions are computationally intensive.

Occupational accidents are a main source of traumatic brain injuries (TBIs), with TBIs accounting for a substantial portion of all work-related deaths. Motor vehicle accidents and falls are consistently leading causes of head injury and fatality across industries. These injuries can have serious long-term consequences on an individual's quality of life and lead to large economic costs within society. This thesis investigated sources of occupational TBI prevention within two industries, construction and professional motorsports. In the last twenty years there have been major safety advancements within these industries, and yet the risk of TBI still exists. There is a need for safety standards that better reflect real-world injury scenarios. First, this thesis considered improvements to construction hard hat safety standards by evaluating the ability of Type 1 and Type 2 hard hats to reduce head injuries due to falls. Hard hats were evaluated over a range of real-world fall heights and three impact locations, using a twin-wire drop tower. Linear acceleration was used to predict injury risks. Type 2 hard hats substantially reduced skull fracture and concussion risk when compared to Type 1, indicating that if more workers wore Type 2 hard hats the risk of severe head injuries in the construction industry would be reduced. Next, this thesis compared real-world motorsport crash simulations and head impact laboratory tests designed to simulate real-world head impacts. Deformation and change in velocity were used to compare the energy managed by each system. The laboratory results generally tested higher severity impacts, with higher accelerations, compared to the simulations, despite managing a similar amount of energy. This indicates a large amount of the energy involved in the simulations was managed by the surrounding protective systems. The differences between systems create challenges for representing real-world crashes in a laboratory setting. Overall, the comparison in this thesis raises considerations for future helmet testing protocols in order to better match real-world simulations. / Master of Science / Occupational accidents are a main source of traumatic brain injuries (TBIs), with TBIs accounting for a substantial portion of all work-related deaths. Motor vehicle accidents and falls are consistently leading causes of head injury and fatality across industries. These injuries can have serious long-term consequences on an individual's quality of life and lead to large economic costs within society. This thesis investigated sources of occupational TBI prevention within two industries, construction and professional motorsports. In the last twenty years there have been major safety advancements within these industries, and yet the risk of TBI still exists. There is a need for safety standards that better reflect real-world injury scenarios. This thesis considered improvements to construction hard hat safety standards by evaluating the ability of two different hard hat types to reduce head injuries due to falls. It also compared real-world motorsport crash simulations and head impact laboratory tests designed to simulate real-world head impacts. This comparison raises considerations for future helmet testing protocols in order to better represent real-world simulations.