ENGINEERING NEWS IN BRIEF

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                  ENGINEERING NEWS IN BRIEF
                        E-Mail Newsletter

                               No.13
             Issued by the Asian TOP Panel, January 2003

           The Chinese Mechanical Engineering Society (CMES)
           The Institution of Engineers, Indonesia (PII)
           The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers (JSME)
           The Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers (KSME)

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About the Asian TOP Panel (ATOP)

    On August 29, 2001, presidents of four engineering societies
gathered in Japan to pave the way for stepped-up collaboration. They
are Chinese Mechanical Engineering Society, Institution of Engineers
Indonesia, Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers, and Korean Society of
Mechanical Engineers.

    They agreed to establish the Asian TOP Panel (ATOP), which is a
voluntary body and open to any Asian engineering society and
institution. At the first meeting, they decided to issue monthly E-mail
newsletter which you are reading now. It will carry short technical
news of Asian countries, and be distributed to all individual members
of the ATOP societies and institutions.

    ATOP will meet every two years. The next meeting will be held in
Korea in 2003.

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[Contents]

(1) First Sino-foreign Invested Motor JV Approved (CMES)
(2) Hyundai Sonata Cars Debut in Beijing (CMES)
(3) Shanghai Builds China's First "Zero Pollution" Battery Bike (CMES)
(4) Kobe Steel Ltd. Develops Software for Analysis of Multi-Body
    Dynamics (JSME)
(5) Tohoku University Develops New Aspects of Electromagnetic
    Processing of Materials (JSME)
(6) Application of CCSEM to Coal Ash Characteristics Study at CRIEPI
    (JSME)

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(1) First Sino-foreign Invested Motor JV Approved (CMES)

Source from Guangzhou Auto Industrial Group said the provincial government of Guangdong has approved the setting up of Guangzhou Auto Export Base, a joint venture invested by Japan Honda, Dongfeng Motor Corporation and Guangzhou Auto Industrial Group. Honda has take up 50 per cent stake of the joint venture.

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(2) Hyundai Sonata Cars Debut in Beijing (CMES)

The first Hyundai Sonata car rolled off production line on Dec. 23, 2002, in a Beijing factory jointly funded by the Beijing Automotive Industry Holding Co. and the Hyundai Motor Co. of the Republic of Korea (ROK).
Jia Qinglin, member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, attended a ceremony to mark the cars' Beijing debut, the result of a 50-50 joint venture deal between the two countries.
According to Xu Heyi, board chairman of the Beijing Hyundai Motors, 50,000 cars will be produced and sold in 2003 and the joint venture will be able to manufacture 300,000 cars in two years.

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(3) Shanghai Builds China's First "Zero Pollution" Battery Bike (CMES)

China's first no-pollution battery electric bike greeted the world Monday in Shanghai and is ready for mass production.
The bike, co-developed by the Shanghai Greenlight Electric Bicycle, Int. and the Powerzinc Electric (Shanghai), Int., is equipped with zinc-air battery, a device that generates power by way of transferring air and zinc ions reaction produced chemical energy into electric energy.
Powered by such a fuel battery, the bike emits no waste even after being disposed, realizing a real "zero pollution" state.
With the zinc-air battery, which could provide 0.2 kW of power per hour per kilogram, a bike could run more than 200 km continuously, about four to five times that of lead-acid battery ones.
Popular as a "promising industry, "China produced 400,000 electric bikes in 2001 and expects 900,000 in 2002, with east China as a bright point increasing at 22 percent annually.

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(4) Kobe Steel Ltd. Develops Software for Analysis of Multi-Body
    Dynamics (JSME)

The research of Multi-Body Dynamics (MBD) has been popular in industry, reflecting the increasing recognition on importance of dynamics-based design of machinery. Commercial software for MBD analysis adopted by corporation are, however, not capable of solving every kind of problems.
In order to perform numerical simulation correctly, thorough consideration in both fundamental theory and numerical method suitable for MBD is required. In Kobe Steel Co. Ltd., in-house MBD software has been developed and applied to problems related to dynamical behavior of industrial- and construction-machinery. The software is based on the finite element method, and the MBD problem that couples with hydraulic system is treated in an implicit manner. A special treatment
for stiff system is also developed to ensure numerical stability.

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(5) Tohoku University Develops New Aspects of Electromagnetic
    Processing of Materials (JSME)

The Department of Aerospace Engineering at Tohoku University has reported three latest technologies, which have been developed under the sponsorship by the Ministry of Education, Science, Sports and Culture of Japan, through Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research on Priority Areas.
Prof. Yasuda's group proposed a stable levitation method of electrically conducting droplet by use of Lorentz force: The hybrid imposition of AC and DC strong magnetic field reportedly reduced all oscillation phenomena in the droplet.
Prof. Ueno's group produced an electromagnetic pump for high-temperature molten metal: Axial flow associated with swirl is driven by rotating twisted magnetic field, which functions as if there were turbine blades.
Prof. Iwai's group developed a solidification control method with direct generation of ultrasonic waves by Lorentz force: Imposing current and magnetic field on solidification, the technique realized an effective refinement of grain.

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(6) Application of CCSEM to Coal Ash Characteristics Study at CRIEPI
    (JSME)

The Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry (CRIEPI), Japan, proposes the Computer controlled scanning electron microscopy (CCSEM) as an effective tool for analyzing the characteristics of minerals in coal and/or coal ash particles produced in high temperature furnace. The technique is applicable to, for example, pulverized coal boilers and coal gasifies.
Detailed information on research topics at CRIEPI is available at:
http://criepi.denken.or.jp/eng/

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Editor: Shinnosuke Obi, International Affairs Committee
Published by The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers
Shinanomachi-Rengakan Bldg, Shinanomachi 35,
Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 160-0016, Japan

FAX : 81-3-5360-3508
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The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers
URL:http//www.jsme.or.jp/English/