Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2013, Mechanical Engineering

The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate the findings brought forth from a research project conducted at The Ohio State University Center for Automotive Research. The objective of the research was to accurately model a 6x4 tractor-trailer rig using TruckSim and simulate severe braking and handling maneuvers with hardware in the loop and software in the loop simulations. For the hardware in the loop simulation (HIL), the tractor model was integrated with a 4s4m anti-lock braking system (ABS) and straight line braking tests were conducted. In addition to this, CAN messages were transmitted and received with the electronic control unit utilized by the ABS system. For the software in the loop simulation (SIL), anti-lock braking (ABS) and roll stability control (RSC) algorithms were developed using Simulink and tested with the TruckSim model. By properly simulating the tractor-trailer rig using HIL and SIL simulations, severe maneuvers could be performed and the rig's response characteristics could be evaluated within a lab environment. The first step in creating the HIL and SIL simulations was to develop a model of a 6x4 tractor using TruckSim. In order to accomplish this, over 100 vehicle parameters were acquired from a real production tractor and entered into TruckSim. Similarly, parameters from a production trailer were acquired and entered as well. By entering these parameters into TruckSim, the dynamic behavior of the actual tractor-trailer could be simulated within a computer environment. The tractor-trailer model was then subjected to simple handling maneuvers without the aid of any vehicle stability controls and its performance was compared against experimental data from the tractor manufacturer. This was done in order to validate the accuracy of the TruckSim model. After the tractor-trailer model was validated, the HIL simulation was developed. Essentially, the HIL simulation integrates actual braking hardware with the computer based tractor mod (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Dennis Guenther Dr. (Advisor); Gary Heydinger Dr. (Advisor) Subjects: Automotive Engineering; Engineering; Mechanical Engineering

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2022, Mechanical Engineering

In recent years, the trend in the automotive industry has been favoring the reduction of fuel consumption in vehicles with the help of new and emerging technologies. This drive stemmed from the developments in communication technologies for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CAV), such as Vehicle to Infrastructure (V2I), Vehicle to Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle to Everything (V2X) communication. Coupled with automated driving capabilities of CAVs, a new and exciting era has started in the world of transportation as each transportation agent is becoming more and more connected. To keep up with the times, research in the academia and the industry has focused on utilizing vehicle connectivity for various purposes, one of the most significant being fuel savings. Motivated by this goal of fuel saving applications of Connected Vehicle (CV) technologies, the main focus and contribution of this dissertation is developing and evaluating a complete Eco-Driving strategy for CAVs. Eco-Driving is a term used to describe the energy efficient use of vehicles. In this dissertation, a complete and comprehensive Eco-Driving strategy for CAVs is studied, where multiple driving modes calculate speed profiles ideal for their own set of constraints simultaneously to save fuel as much as possible while a High Level (HL) controller ensures smooth transitions between the driving modes for Eco-Driving. The first step in making a CAV achieve Eco-Driving is to develop a route-dependent speed profile called Eco-Cruise that is fuel optimal. The methods explored to achieve this optimally fuel economic speed profile are Dynamic Programming (DP) and Pontryagin's Minimum Principle (PMP). Using a generalized Matlab function that minimizes the fuel rate for a vehicle travelling on a certain route with route gradient, acceleration and deceleration limits, speed limits and traffic sign (traffic lights and STOP signs) locations as constraints, a DP based fuel optimal velocity profile is found. The ego CAV (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Levent Guvenc (Advisor); Mrinal Kumar (Committee Member); Bilin Aksun-Guvenc (Committee Member) Subjects: Automotive Engineering; Computer Science; Design; Energy; Engineering; Experiments; Mechanical Engineering; Systems Design; Technology; Transportation

Doctor of Philosophy in Engineering, Cleveland State University, 2021, Washkewicz College of Engineering

Smart electromechanical systems have begun superseding old electromechanical systems that have static control paradigms. Designing smart machines always includes two main challenges: hardware co-design and suitable control hierarchy. Hardware co-design provides a homogeneous environment that can enhance the reliability of sensory acquisition tasks and control tasks, which directly serve the control hierarchy. The control hierarchy is usually developed to achieve different control goals such as trajectory tracking, which in turn achieve the higher-level goals. Prostheses are electromechanical devices that are attached to the human body to replace or augment a missing part of the body. A lower limb prosthetic robot (i.e., an active prosthetic knee) can be considered an ideal experimental test rig. Prostheses have many control problems such as unmodeled dynamics and high parameter uncertainty. This study aims to investigate different challenges that face smart prosthesis design, starting from hardware development and ending with testing new smart control algorithms. This study has three main parts. First, prosthetic framework design, which includes actuation design and a wearable sensor network. Actuator and sensor networks are co-designed to provide rich kinetic and kinematic information. Second, system identification and gait parameter estimation techniques are implemented to model various prosthetic leg sub-modules. Third, a hybrid controller composed of high-level and low-level sub-controllers is investigated. Data-driven control (DDC) and learning-based control (LBC) paradigms are utilized to form a novel control scheme which shows a promising control capability especially for cases that have unmodeled dynamics and high parameter uncertainty as in human-prosthesis.

Committee: Daniel Simon (Committee Chair); Ana Stankovic (Committee Member); Douglas Wajda (Committee Member); Sandra Rua (Committee Member); Hanz Richter (Committee Member) Subjects: Electrical Engineering; Robotics; Systems Design

Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2018, Mechanical Engineering

Vehicle integration testing has been increasingly front-loaded in the automotive development cycle to reduce prototyping and testing costs. One method of performing these tests is X-in-the-loop integration, which allows a verification and validation workflow from the design of control algorithms in offline high-fidelity models (MIL) to the online integration verification with prototype control hardware (HIL). A 10-speed automatic transmission is used as an example to traverse the gap between an offline high-fidelity model and a real-time capable online model. The model is split into three subsystems and each is built up from the component level using one-dimensional mechanics and zero-dimensional hydraulic fluid flow. The high-fidelity model parameters are perturbed to judge sensitivity of output performance metrics. The model is reduced by removing higher-order derivatives and faster dynamics at the component level. Multiple reduced models were generated and tested for errors relative to the high-fidelity version and increases in model execution speed. After reduction, a full automatic transmission model with hydraulic actuation circuit and dynamic torque converter has been implemented on a dSpace HIL simulator for real-time testing without control hardware in the loop.

Committee: Shawn Midlam-Mohler (Advisor); Krishnaswamy Srinivasan (Committee Member); Punit Tulpule (Committee Member) Subjects: Mechanical Engineering

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2017, Electrical and Computer Engineering

Automotive radar is an emerging field of research and development. Technological advancements in this field will improve safety for vehicles, pedestrians, and bicyclists, and enable the development of autonomous vehicles. Many automotive companies have already begun to develop autonomous emergency braking (AEB) to avoid or mitigate pedestrian and bicyclist crashes. However, the effectiveness of such systems needs to be accurately tested using standardized test procedures, which have yet to be agreed upon by the international automobile industry and associated government agencies. European testing standards, such as the Euro New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) AEB and AEB-VRU (vulnerable road user), are currently among the first of these standards, and are used for vehicle and pedestrian targets; with plans to include bicyclist targets in the near future. Such standards allow consumers and government regulatory agencies to assess the effectiveness of a vehicle equipped with an AEB system. Obviously, it is neither practical nor safe to use real targets such as pedestrians, bicyclists, or vehicles to conduct such tests. Therefore, a key element of standardized AEB test protocols is standardized surrogate targets that can produce similar sensor responses as real-life cars, pedestrians, and bicycles. In addition, such standard targets need to withstand repeated impacts from the vehicle under test (VUT), prevent damage to the VUT, and be easily reassembled after impacts. This dissertation establishes the steps for characterization of various targets through measurements, the design of a surrogate bicyclist target, and demonstrates successful hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) emulation of targets for AEB scenarios. To design a surrogate target means that the original target must be accurately characterized. This can be done by first studying the far-field radar cross section (RCS) of the target. Since most AEB test scenarios range from 0 m to 100 m, the RCS measurement in t (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Chi-Chih Chen (Advisor); Joel Johnson (Committee Member); Graeme Smith (Committee Member); Ahmet Selamet (Committee Member) Subjects: Automotive Engineering; Electrical Engineering; Electromagnetics

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2015, Electrical and Computer Engineering

The United States and Europe are currently integrating large capacity wind generation systems into the electric power grid. It is expected that by 2030, over 20% of the electric power in the U.S will be provided from wind energy. This is raising concerns about the stability of the electrical grid due to a large number of wind turbines on-line. Regulations are already being revised to ensure that the grid remains reliable with both current and future wind generating capabilities. Although there are many turbine technologies with various control philosophies, state-of-the-art wind farms are based on Doubly-Fed Induction Generators (DFIG). Due to its unique design, it has several benefits over traditional turbines. However, because of the response of the DFIG during large grid transients, it does not meet most utility company standards. Low-voltage-ride-through (LVRT), or Fault-ride-through (FRT), capability of DFIG-based wind turbines during grid faults is one of the core requirements. A vital research topic is alleviating the shortcomings of the DFIG-based wind turbine during grid faults without adding additional cost, or introducing reliability issues. In this dissertation, both system and circuit level studies are performed on the modeling, advanced control, and grid integration of the DFIG-based wind turbines during normal and FRT conditions. First, a detailed description of the dynamic model of the DFIG-based wind turbine including both mechanical and electrical components, is presented. Then, the DFIG classical control system, including: the decoupled control of the generated active and reactive power, the voltage control of the intermediate DC bus, and the power factor control by the grid-side PWM converter are also developed. Second, a comprehensive overview of the grid code requirements and specifications for the operation and grid-integration of wind turbines, is presented. A detailed investigation of the LVRT grid code requirement, including th (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Longya Xu (Advisor); Vadim Utkin (Committee Chair); Jin Wang (Committee Chair) Subjects: Electrical Engineering; Energy

Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2013, Mechanical Engineering

The work presented within this thesis consists of the validation of a supervisory controller and vehicle simulator for the ECO Saver IV demonstration bus being developed as part of the National Fuel Cell Bus Program (NFCBP). The goal of the NFCBP is to develop fuel cell transit buses such that a U.S. industry for fuel cell bus technology can be established through both technology innovation and increased public awareness of fuel cell vehicles. The use of fuel cells in vehicles is desirable due to their high efficiencies and zero emissions, allowing the transportation sector to rely less heavily on petroleum and carbon based fuels that emit hazardous greenhouse gases. The ECO Saver IV, as designed by the DesignLine Corporation through a contract with the Center for Transportation and the Environment, is a battery dominant fuel cell hybrid bus that takes advantage of the benefits of hybridization in conjunction with the benefits of the fuel cell. The team of researchers at The Ohio State University (OSU) Center for Automotive Research (CAR) served as a subcontractor to develop a supervisory controller and fuel cell hybrid bus simulator, modeled after the chosen powertrain architecture. The validation performed involved the use of software-in-the-loop and hardware-in-the-loop simulations, where the results were compared to baseline model-in-the-loop simulations. The driving conditions of the intended application of the demonstration bus, i.e., integration into the OSU Campus Area Bus Services (CABS) fleet, were taken into consideration through the development of real-world drive cycles that were representative of actual CABS bus routes. A new driver model was developed that solved issues related to tracking distance, velocity and road grade to enable the use of real-world drive cycles. The results of the validation are to be used in the final phases of development and construction of the ECO Saver IV fuel cell hybrid transit bus to prove the effectiveness of (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Shawn Midlam-Mohler Dr. (Advisor); Yann Guezennec Dr. (Committee Member) Subjects: Automotive Engineering; Engineering; Mechanical Engineering

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2013, Mechanical Engineering

According to NHTSA's 2011 Traffic Safety Facts, large-truck occupant fatalities increased from 530 in 2010 to 635 in 2011, which is a 20% increase. This was a second consecutive year in which large truck fatalities have increased (9% increase from 2009 to 2010). There was also a 15% increase in large truck occupant injuries from 2010. Moreover, the fatal crashes involving large trucks increased by 1.9%, in contrast to other-vehicle-occupant fatalities that declined by 3.6% from 2010. Given the high accident involvement rate of heavy trucks, the research presented in this dissertation focussed on methods of improving and testing heavy truck ESC performance. The first part of the research, aimed at estimating trailer parameters and states using sensors on the tractor to enhance the capabilities of the tractor based ESC unit. The mass of the vehicle and road grade are first estimated using recursive least square estimation. The trailer CG position is then estimated using the load on the tractor drive axels. This is followed by a planar model of an articulated vehicle to calculate the lateral acceleration, longitudinal acceleration and yaw rate of the trailer CG. Finally a Dual Extended Kalman Filter is developed to estmate trailer roll angle and roll parameters. The second phase of the research involved the development of a state of the art Hardware in the Loop simulation setup to test heavy truck ESC systems. The design of the HIL system is briefly discussed followed by the modeling of the vehicles in TruckSim. This is followed by a rigorous validation of the vehicle models and the HIL setup. Finally some of the applications of the validated HIL setup is discussed. This includes an indepth study of the Sine with Dwell maneuver and effects of vehicle speed, surface friction and CG height on the vehicle stability. This is followed by the design of a steering controller which is used to study the advantages afforded by the ESC system in an actual crash sc (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Dennis Guenther Dr. (Advisor); Gary Heydinger Dr. (Committee Member); Ahmet Kahraman Dr. (Committee Member); Junmin Wang Dr. (Committee Member) Subjects: Automotive Engineering; Mechanical Engineering

MS, University of Cincinnati, 2002, Engineering : Computer Engineering

This thesis investigated a hardware interpreter for sparse matrix LU factorization. LU factorization is one of the most commonly used methods for solving a system of linear equations representing an electrical network. In this method, a system of equations Ax=B is solved by factoring the matrix A into its Lower (L) and Upper (U) triangular matrices. L and U are then used to obtain the unknown vector x by forward and backward substitution. Factorization of A is O(n3) time-complex, requiring techniques to speed it up. We explored a hardware-based interpreter for the unrolled and compressed LU factorization code. The inputs to the hardware interpreter were a stream of instructions and a list of non-zeros. The instructions were decompressed on-the-fly and executed on the non-zero list using a special-purpose floating-point unit. Three cases of a Harvard-type hardware architecture were investigated; the architecture cases were modeled at behavioral and structural levels of abstraction and verified for functional and performance correctness. The well-known linear-system-solver software, SuperLU, was used for performance comparison.We found that all the architecture cases studied showed a significant memory interface throttle; an architecture case which used a 4-port interleaved memory for storing data, performed the fastest. Another case explored was a faster to implement all FPGA solution, which used FPGA block-RAMs as a true dual-port memory; this case did not perform as fast as the earlier case with 4-port memory. The third case with standard one-port memory was the slowest. We showed that with an efficient implementation of the floating-point unit resulting in higher frequency operations, all three cases of the proposed architecture out-perform the software based LU decomposition.

Committee: Dr. Hal Carter (Advisor) Subjects:

Doctor of Philosophy in Engineering, University of Toledo, 2011, College of Engineering

The technologies of hybridization of vehicles have been proven to significantly improve the fuel economy and reduce the environmental pollution. These technologies combine additional power sources with a traditional internal combustion engine. In some other modern vehicles, advanced cylinder management is the means to reduce fuel consumption and emissions. While these advanced technologies aim at energy savings and preserving the environment they create additional noise, vibration and harshness (NVH) problem. The noise, vibration and harshness problem has been a major area of research in the automotive industry. Vibration is the main cause for noise. With the advent of alternative energy and hybrid vehicles come new vibration problems and challenges that require nontraditional solutions. Semi-active vibration isolation devices are preferred to address the problem due to their effectiveness and affordability. A magnetorheological (MR) fluid mount can provide effective vibration isolation for applications such as hybrid vehicles. The MR fluid can produce different levels of damping when exposed to different levels of magnetic field. The fluid can be working in three modes which are the flow mode, shear mode and squeeze mode. A mixed mode MR fluid mount was designed to operate in a combination of the flow mode and the squeeze mode. Each of the working modes and the combined working mode has been studied. The mount's performance has been verified in simulation and experiments. The focus of the current study is on the design of a control system for the mixed mode MR fluid mount. Based on a model for the uni-axial MR mount a controller has been designed to achieve the lowest possible vibration transmissibility. Furthermore, the MR mount in two degree of freedom structure has been modeled. Displacement transmissibility and force transmissibility are considered in this scenario. It is desirable to minimize both transmissibilities. The controllers to achieve the lowest val (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Mohammad Elahinia PhD (Committee Chair); Mansoor Alam PhD (Committee Member); Mohamed Hefzy PhD (Committee Member); Ezzatollah Salari PhD (Committee Member); Mohsin Jamali PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Automotive Engineering; Electrical Engineering; Mechanical Engineering

Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2011, Electrical and Computer Engineering

Technological systems today require increasingly robust and precise electronic controls to deliver improved safety, reliability, and performance while also delivering more numerous and diverse results faster than ever. Additionally, automotive technology is changing rapidly to meet increasingly stringent emissions and fuel economy government regulations while adding new consumer features and capabilities to interface with portable devices such as smart phones and music players. Automotive technology includes advanced vehicle technologies ranging from powerful electric machines to fuel cell systems and battery technologies. In this thesis, modern tools and methods such as hardware in the loop (HIL) simulation, rapid prototyping embedded control systems, and auto code generation are applied to a prototype vehicle design and the results and benefits are discussed. Hardware in the loop simulation is presented as a powerful tool for control validation because it can be applied to vehicle designs independent of vehicle availability, and the hardware and software tested using the process can be scalable and adaptive to relevant problems throughout the design process. Automotive manufacturers such as General Motors and Ford have been showing increased interest in HIL simulation and its benefits for improving vehicle reliability, safety, and maintenance costs. Controller validation and failure simulation have become increasingly popular uses of HIL simulation. A much faster design cycle has been a side effect, drawing the attention of other industries. The work described in this thesis has been applied to the Ohio State EcoCAR vehicle during all three years of the EcoCAR competition. EcoCAR is a student competition among sixteen North American universities in which students design and build advanced powertrain vehicles based on a donated platform to compete on metrics of fuel economy, emissions, performance, and utility. The OSU team demonstrated a refined vehicle using seve (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Dr. Stephen Yurkovich (Advisor); Dr. Giorgio Rizzoni (Committee Member) Subjects: Energy; Engineering

Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2010, Electrical and Computer Engineering

RF systems onboard rotorcrafts are susceptible to a periodic variation in both the magnitude and phase of the received signals due to the rotation of the rotor blades. This is often referred to as rotor blade modulation (RBM). As its name indicates, RBM causes a modulation of the incident signal, which is dependent on the frequency and direction of the incident signal. As one might imagine, RBM has the potential to degrade a given RF system. Therefore, RBM must be accounted for when characterizing the performance of any RF system onboard a rotorcraft. The first part of this thesis develops methods for incorporating RBM in computer or hardware-in-the-loop (HITL) simulations of RF systems onboard rotorcrafts. The methods are verified using the response of an antenna mounted on a simple rotorcraft that is analyzed through numerical electromagnetic computations as well as characterized by measurements. In the second part of this thesis the effects of RBM on digital communication systems are discussed. It is demonstrated that one can mitigate the effects of RBM within the receiver using spatial diversity and simple equalization techniques.

Committee: Inder Gupta PhD (Advisor); Joel Johnson PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Electrical Engineering

Master of Science (MS), Ohio University, 2004, Electrical Engineering & Computer Science (Engineering and Technology)

This thesis describes the development of a fixed base flight simulator capable of hardware-in-the-loop testing of aviation electronics, or “avionics”. The system is composed of a pilot controlled 6 degree-of-freedom aircraft model, a flight display, and a hardware interface to an ARINC 429 avionics databus. Avionics can be connected to this databus for testing. These systems are combined in a modular fashion allowing easy re-configuration for use with various aircraft models, and testing of avionics using databuses other than ARINC 429. This modular design is achieved by using an aircraft model constructed in Matlab's Simulink, and by relaying the model data to the display and ARINC 429 interface using the UDP network protocol.

Committee: Maarten Uijt de Haag (Advisor) Subjects:

Master of Science, University of Akron, 2007, Electrical Engineering

This thesis explains various stages of the vehicle controller development, especially for a Hybrid Electric Vehicle (HEV), and documents the development of a platform for vehicle controller testing. Two stages of testing a vehicle controller, namely Software-in-Loop (SIL) simulation and Hardware-in-Loop (HIL) simulation, are explained in a stepwise manner for the series-parallel 2x2 HEV. The idea of using a common tool from the design stage to the prototyping stage is demonstrated. The series-parallel 2x2 HEV is modeled using the Powertrain Systems Analysis Toolkit (PSAT) in Matlab/Simulink. A rule based vehicle control strategy is added to the existing control libraries in PSAT. The SIL testing of the HEV model is done by exercising it over various drive cycles. A HIL platform is built from the ground up using commercially available off-the-shelf computers and Input/Output cards. The offline model of the HEV is simulated on the HIL platform to start the vehicle controller testing process. The preliminary HEV model was used to demonstrate the capabilities of the HIL setup. The HIL simulation setup is scalable and allows the incorporation of additional computational nodes for distributed simulation of complex systems without a major change to the original setup. The HEV model is run in real time on two computation nodes and the differences between offline and online simulations are discussed. The HIL simulation platform is successfully built and can be used for testing and tuning the vehicle controller.

Committee: Iqbal Husain (Advisor) Subjects:

Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2013, Mechanical Engineering

The purpose of this thesis is to develop a vehicle dynamics model of a 6 X 4 cab-over tractor and a 2-axle semitrailer combination and a model-based design of ABS and ESC controllers. In addition to this, a Hardware-in-the-Loop (HIL) simulation of an Anti-lock Braking System (ABS) for a heavy truck was performed using dSPACE. TruckSim, developed by Mechanical Simulation Corporation (MSC), was used to model the vehicle dynamics. The tractor was equipped with disc brakes and the trailer was equipped with drum brakes. Model validation was by performing various dynamic maneuvers like J-turn, double lane change, decreasing radius curve test, high dynamic steer input and constant radius test with increasing speed. The model was validated in all three loading conditions: Bobtail or solo tractor, low CG trailer and high CG trailer condition. The vehicle responses obtained from TruckSim were compared against the experimental field test data obtained from the Heavy Truck Manufacturer (HTM). A hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) simulation of a heavy truck ABS system was setup in order to better understand the ABS control strategy and various activation thresholds involved. The test bench consists of six (6) brake chambers, ABS modulator valves, ABS electronic control unit from a commercial supplier, two air reservoirs, wheel speed sensors and pressure sensors for measuring the individual brake chamber pressures. dSPACE midsize was used to interface the vehicle model in TruckSim with the hardware components in the physical realm. The simulator converts the digital signals from TruckSim such as lateral acceleration, yaw rate and tractor speed into suitable analog signals which serve as inputs to the control module. For this simulation, the wheel speed signals coming from TruckSim were converted into an analog signal of sinusoidal form whose frequency is proportional to the wheel spin rate. TruckSim along with the hardware components thus forms a closed-loop system. The algorithm in (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Dennis Guenther PhD (Advisor); Gary Heydinger PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Automotive Engineering; Mechanical Engineering

Master of Science, The Ohio State University, 2013, Nuclear Engineering

A hardware-in-the-loop model was developed to represent digital sensing and control of steam generator water-level. The model was created with an intention to serve as a component within a larger, distributed digital systems conceptual testing facility. In the present application, a software model simulates a nuclear pressurized water reactor core, and the core is cooled by a hardware and software model of a Westinghouse U-tube steam generator. The present application is configured using plant specifications consistent with “Plant X”. Software was written in C++¿¿, and hardware components include Phidgets and Measurement Computing digital input-output modules, proportional solenoid valves, a PC cooling pump, and gear pumps. This model assumes perfect implementation of sliding average-core-temperature control. During plant startup or normal operation, plant power precisely determines all steam flow characteristics. Liquid water simulates secondary coolant flow. Water pumped from a tank simulates steam, and recuperating feed water responds to subsequent level readings. Level readings as a function of plant power are measured and lie within the alarm-free region of the narrow range (+/-5% of the level set point). This design has been developed for incorporation within a distributed hardware/software component within a digital systems conceptual testing facility for digital systems testing by network-distributed control.

Committee: Carol Smidts PhD (Advisor); Tunc Aldemir PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Engineering; Nuclear Engineering