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The present study deals with natural lignocellulose fibril extricated from habara plant. The fibrils are found to possess high level of amorphous constituents. KOH Surface modification of fibrils at 5wt% enhanced the crystallographic index of habara plant fibers. The thermal stability of the fibers is found to be promising in comparison with unexposed habara plant fiber. The reinforcement of habara plant fibers with epoxy matrix contributed to utmost tensile and flexural strength of 79 MPa and 121 MPa. Scanning electron microscope analysis exposed the intricate surface of habara plant fibers are porous and rough in nature of the fibers subjected to KOH modification. The foresaid composites as application in automobile interior will result in reduction of land filling caused by man made fibril fortified polymer composites.

Floor consoles or Center consoles are an indispensable part of Automotive Cockpit systems in modern passenger vehicles. It occupies space between the front seats in the car and has a lot of utilities and functionalities. The center console design can be very simple as just providing an enclosure for the gear shifter and parking brake and as complex as having storage bins with armrest which can slide. Now-a-days a lot of functionalities are being provided by the center console such as housing the AC vents at the rear, provision for USB and power outlets etc. All these utilities within the center console demand a certain amount of structural rigidity to meet the functional requirements as well as applicable regulatory requirements. The console mounting bracket usually serves to attach the plastic center console to the steel underbody. It also acts as a load carrier for the console and its design influences the overall stiffness and modal characteristics of the console system.

In recent years, there is increasing demand for every CAE engineer on their confidence level of the virtual simulation results due to the upfront robust design requirement during early stage of an automotive product development. Apart from vehicle feel factor NVH characteristics, there are certain vibration target requirements at system or component level which need to be addressed during design stage itself in order to achieve the desired functioning during vehicle operating conditions. Vehicle passive safety system is one which primarily consists of acceleration sensors, control module and air-bag deployment system. Control module’s decision is based on accelerometer sensor signals so that its mounting locations should meet the sufficient inertance or dynamic stiffness performance in order to avoid distortion in signals due to its structural resonances.

Pass-By-Noise (PBN) requirements area an important aspect of NVH development of a commercial vehicle. The PBN on an Intermediate commercial vehicle (ICV) with refrigerator container was the subject of this study. This vehicle emitted PBN greater than accepted threshold due to its configuration. The overall approach to identify the sources and contributors for PBN was to test the vehicle in its baseline condition as well as with improvements. Near source noise measurements were performed at all potential noise contributors. A windowing technique was used to identify the potential noise sources. This Windowing technique is the exposing of each individual noise source while keeping all others shielded. This technique is reliable and quickly reveals significant noise contributors. Improvements to noise sources were reviewed for effectiveness to the overall PBN and overall recommendations were made.

Mufflers are devices installed within the exhaust system of most internal combustion engines to reduce the noise created by the engine. Mufflers may be broadly classified into two types based on the method by which they attenuate the engine noise. First being reflective type which works by the principle of destructive interference of acoustic pressure waves while the second type absorbs the acoustic energy of the exhaust resulting in noise reduction. To study the contribution of each, Design of Experiments (DOE) was carried out for individual elements. Based on this, prototypes were manufactured to accommodate different configuration changes specified in the DOE. For all the prototypes, Insertion Loss (IL) and Transmission Loss (TL) tests are conducted and the results are analyzed to yield the contribution of each acoustic element towards the overall exhaust noise attenuation by the muffler of interest.