Projects

Project 1: Accident reduction system design by detecting drowsiness of drivers.

Driver’s drowsiness is one of the main causes behind accidents. As driving is a continuous process, it creates fatigue. Drowsiness is a common phenomenon for drivers while driving for a long distance and duration. Accidents become inevitable. Drunk drivers are another cause for accidents. This project focuses on detecting a driver’s drowsiness, and detection of alcohol. With an alcohol detection system, the vehicle would not start in the presence of alcohol on the driver. If the driver is detected drowsy, the speed of the vehicle would be decreased gradually as well as starting an alarming system to notify the driver. Driver’s drowsiness is detected based on head motion. Speed control has been prototyped using DC motors. The alarm system will notify the driver if he is drowsy or distracted. As the speed of the vehicle will be reduced when drowsiness is sensed, accidents can be prevented for these cases in an efficient way. This system can also notify whether the driver is distracted while driving. To detect head motion, a head mount has been devised.

Project 2: Shell and Tube Heat Exchanger with Helical Baffle.
Software Used: Ansys, Solidworks, HTRI, 3E Plus

In this study, three-dimensional numerical simulation of shell and tube heat exchangers (STHXs) with continuous helical baffles (STHXsHB) is carried out and is performed based on the simulation results. The STHXs contain 25 tubes inside a 500 mm long and 200 mm diameter shell, and the mass flow rate of shell-side fluid is varied from .3 kg/s to .4 kg/s. At first, physical and mathematical models are developed and numerically simulated using the finite element method (FEM). For the validation of the computational model, shell side average Nusselt number (Nu) is calculated from the simulation results and compared with the available experimental results. The comparative study showed that STHXsHB has a 72-127% higher heat transfer coefficient per unit pressure drop compared to the conventional STHXsSB for the same shell-side mass flow rate. Moreover, STHXsHB has 59-63% lower shell-side pressure drop than STHXsSB.