Journal of Engineering

One of the most important problems that faces the concrete industry in Iraq is the deterioration due to internal sulfate attack , since it reduces the compressive strength and increases the expansion of concrete. Consequently, the concrete structure may be damage .The effects of total and total effective sulfate contents on high strength concrete (HSC) have been studied in the present study.


The research studied the effect of sulfate content in cement , sand and gravel , as well as comparing the total sulfate content with the total effective SO3 content. Materials used were divided into two groups of SO3 in cement ,three groups of SO3 in sand ,and two groups of SO3 in gravel.


The results show that considering the total effective sulfate content is better than the total content of sulfates since the effect of sulfate in each constituent of concrete, depends on it's granular size .The smaller the particle size of the material the more effective is the sulfate in it. Therefore, it is recommended to follow the Iraqi specification for total effective sulfate content, because it gives more flexibility to the use of sand and gravel with higher sulfate content.


The results of compressive strength at 90-days show that the effect of total effective SO3 content of ( 2.647% , 2.992% , 3.424% ) that correspond to total sulfate of ( 3.778%, 3.294%, 4.528%) decrease the compressive strength by (7.53%, 11.44%, 14.59%) respectively.

The corrosion protection of low carbon steel in 2.5 M HCl solution by kiwi juice was studied at different temperatures and immersion times by weight loss technique. To study the determination of the optimum conditions from statistical design in evaluation of a corrosion inhibitor, three variables, were considered as the most dominant variables. These variables are: temperature, inhibitor concentration (extracted kiwi juice) and immersion time at static conditions.


These three variables are manipulated through the experimental work using central composite rotatable Box – Wilson Experimental Design (BWED) where second order polynomial model was proposed to correlate the studied variables with the corrosion rate of low carbon steel alloy to estimate the coefficients by nonlinear regression analysis method based on Rosenbrock and Quasi-Newton estimation method in as few experiments as possible to determinate of the optimum conditions of the proposed polynomial adopted via STATISTICA software. The parametric study on corrosion inhibition process using response surface methodology (RSM) is presented in this paper.


The study shows that the immersion time and temperature of corroding medium had shown negative dependence of great significance in increase the corrosion rate while the other studied variable (i.e. inhibitor concentration) had shown large positive dependence in reduce the corrosion rate of low carbon steel alloy.


Optimum conditions for achieving the minimum corrosion rate are obtained from optimizing the above correlation and are found as follow: 42.86 °C temperature of corroding medium, 29.29 cm3/L inhibitor concentration and 2.65 h immersion time. In these circumstances, the value of inhibition efficiency obtained was 96.09 %. It could be concluded that Box-Wilson experimental design was adequately applicable in the optimization of process variables and that kiwi juice sufficiently inhibited the corrosion for low carbon steel at the conditions of the experiment.

An analytical approach based on field data was used to determine the strength capacity of large diameter bored type piles. Also the deformations and settlements were evaluated for both vertical and lateral loadings. The analytical predictions are compared to field data obtained from a proto-type test pile used at Tharthar –Tigris canal Bridge. They were found to be with acceptable agreement of 12% deviation.


Following ASTM standards D1143M-07e1,2010, a test schedule of five loading cycles were proposed for vertical loads and series of cyclic loads to simulate horizontal loading .The load test results and analytical data of 1.95m in diameter test pile proved efficiently to carry a working load of 450 tons. The calculated lateral displacements based on a specified coefficient of subgrade reaction are compared to the measured values from dial gauges and strain gauges placed at various locations along the length of the pile.

Fuzzy logic is used to solve the load flow and contingency analysis problems, so decreasing computing time and its the best selection instead of the traditional methods. The proposed method is very accurate with outstanding computation time, which made the fuzzy load flow (FLF) suitable for real time application for small- as well as large-scale power systems. In addition that, the FLF efficiently able to solve load flow problem of ill-conditioned power systems and contingency analysis. The FLF method using Gaussian membership function requires less number of iterations and less computing time than that required in the FLF method using triangular membership function. Using sparsity technique for the input Ybus sparse matrix data gives reduction in overall computation time and storage requirements. The performance of the used methods had been tested on two typical test systems being the IEEE 14-bus and 30-bus systems in addition to the 362-bus Iraqi National Grid. All the obtained results under normal operating conditions show that the computation time of the fuzzy Load Flow (FLF) is less than the fast decoupled load flow (FDLF).

This research aims to choose the appropriate probability ‎ distribution ‎‏‎ to the reliability‎ analysis‎ for an item through ‎ collected data for operating and stoppage time of the case study.


Appropriate choice for .probability distribution is when the data look to be on or close the form fitting line for probability plot and test the data for goodness of fit .


Minitab’s 17 software was used ‎ for this purpose after arranging collected data and setting it in the the program‎.


The program results gave the‎ best or well-fitting distribution among four of default probability distributions, that will use in order to estimate the distribution parameters values,‎ for reliability determination and analysis. From probability plot can estimate time that designates the percent of the item's failure.

Many organizations today are interesting to implementing lean manufacturing principles that should enable them to eliminating the wastes to reducing a manufacturing lead time. This paper concentrates on increasing the competitive level of the company in globalization markets and improving of the productivity by reducing the manufacturing lead time. This will be by using the main tool of lean manufacturing which is value stream mapping (VSM) to identifying all the activities of manufacturing process (value and non-value added activities) to reducing elimination of wastes (non-value added activities) by converting a manufacturing system to pull instead of push by applying some of pull system strategies as kanban and first on first out lane (FIFO). ARENA software is used to simulate the current and future state. This work is executed in the state company for electrical industries in Baghdad. The obtained results of the application showed that implementation of lean principles helped on reducing of a manufacturing lead time by 33%.

The world's population growth and the increasing demand for new infrastructure facilities and buildings , present us with the vision of a higher resources consumption, specially in the form of more durable concrete such as High Performance Concrete (HPC) . Moreover , the growth of the world pollution by plastic waste has been tremendous. The aim of this research is to investigate the change in mechanical properties of HPC with added waste plastics in concrete. For this purpose 2.5%, 5% and 7.5% in volume of natural fine aggregate in the HPC mixes were replaced by an equal volume of Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) waste , got by shredded PET bottles. The mechanical properties (compressive, splitting tensile, and flexural strength ) evaluated at the ages of (7 ,28, 56 and 91) days while the static modulus of elasticity tested at (28 and 91) days . The results indicated that HPC containing PET-aggregate presented lower compressive strength and static elasticity . The splitting strength displayed an arising trend at the initial stages, however, they have a tendency to decrease after a while. On the other hand, flexural strength results gave better modulus of rapture at all ages of curing , as compared with reference concrete specimens.

Chilled ceilings systems offer potential for overall capital savings. The main aim of the present research is to investigate the thermal performance of the indirect contact closed circuit cooling tower, ICCCCT used with chilled ceiling, to gain a deeper knowledge in this important field of engineering which has been traditionally used in various industrial & HVAC systems. To achieve this study, experimental work were implemented for the ICCCCT use with chilled ceiling. In this study the thermal performances of closed wet cooling tower use with chilled ceiling is experimentally and theoretically investigated. Different experimental tests were conducted by varying the controlling parameters to investigate their effects on the ICCCCT characteristics such as tower cooling capacity, chilled ceiling cooling capacity, tower saturation efficiency, mass transfer coefficient and heat transfer coefficient. The following controlling parameters are varied during experiments: spray water flow rate (90 to 150 kg/hr), ambient air wet bulb temperature (12 to 18 oC), and also changing chilled ceiling flow rate (2 to 6 l/min).

Buckling and free vibration analysis of laminated rectangular plates with uniform and non uniform distributed in-plane compressive loadings along two opposite edges is performed using the Ritz method. Classical laminated plate theory is adopted. The static component of the applied in- plane loading are assumed to vary according to uniform, parabolic or linear distributions. Initially, the plate membrane problem is solved using the Ritz method; subsequently, using Hamilton’s variational principle, linear homogeneous algebraic equations in terms of unknown are generated, the set of linear algebraic equations can be solved as an Eigen-value problem. Buckling loads for laminated plates with different combinations of boundary conditions are obtained and their effect on the natural frequencies of plate are also investigated. The proposed method is verified by comparing results to data obtained by the finite element method (FEM) using ANSYS program, from experimental program and that obtained by other researchers. Analytical results are also presented to bring out the effects of aspect ratio, boundary conditions, lamination angle, and loading type on the critical buckling load and natural frequency.

In this paper an atmometer apparatus were used in the greenhouses for estimating reference evapotranspiration values. Experimental work was conducted in the agriculture research center in the College of Agriculture-University of Baghdad west of the city of Baghdad. One atmometer was used in eggplant greenhouse and in cucumber greenhouse through the winter growing season 2013-2014. FAO Penman-Monteith equation was applied outside the greenhouse and used only 65% from the value of ETo in the greenhouses for estimating the reference evapotranspiration in the greenhouse. Moreover, Penman-Monteith equation was applied in greenhouses for the evaluating the performance of the atmometer. The results show that the error analyses between FAO Penman-Monteith equation in greenhouse and the atmometer readings, the root mean square difference (RMSD), mean bias error (MBE) and relative error (RE) for eggplant and cucumber greenhouses were: 1.163mm/day, 0.933mm/day, 30.19%, and 0.688mm/day, 0.518mm/day and 22.93%, respectively. A fair agreement was found. While the error analyses between 65% from outdoor ETo of FAO Penman-Monteith equation and the atmometer readings, the RMSD, MBE and RE for eggplant and cucumber greenhouses were: 0.930mm/day, 0.743mm/day, 24.27%, and 0.374mm/day, 0.289mm/day and 12.47%, respectively. A good agreement was found. The atmometer apparatus could be used successfully by researchers and farmers in estimation daily or weekly reference evapotranspiration in greenhouses as well as in low technology greenhouses.

Technology is an important factor for achieving architecture as an impact and vulnerability. It represents one of the significant elements in creating the intellectual framework, as well as having its own intellectual breakdown, while values constitute the most important and obviously factor of the community's intellectual. Research aims was determined accordingly by: investigating the role and impact of values and their relationship to technology in architecture.


In this context, the research investigated values and technology in architecture, through discussing their aspects and dimensions in architecture. In the context of values, the research discussed their concept and the related ones to have a concrete definition, and discussed manifestations in terms intellectual and social system represented by value's judgment and value's system, that creating the most important factor for the differentiation communities, which were leading to the study of values in architecture. In this context, the research identifies trends of values in architecture to determine and adopt the private values-oriented in architecture.


In the other hand, the research discussed the concept of technology, its impact on the architecture through dealing with architectural technology and its dimensions according to the context. A focus was made on the intellectual dimension, which lies under the physical aspect of the technology. Then a convergence technology utilization and the expressive aspects was made within an input and output of architectural practice which implemented on selected projects. A set of conclusions was achieved regarding the theoretical research framework and the case study as well.

In Production and Operations Management the specialists have tried to develop a strategy to counter the risks arising from the activities of the organization and of waste of various types and therefore the risk management in the contemporary framework represents a phenomenon of new quality, and can not be this phenomenon to take practical dimensions, but the development of culture of the organization towards the risks and deal with all aspects and paint ways to address them within an integrated program, and requires new skills and systems provide accurate information capable of coordination between the various parties within the organization.


The research aims to develop a blue print to analyze the relationship between the impact of risk and stages of implementing of the project and, the effect of risk relationship with the type of contract, and the impact of risks to do with the type of construction works. In this paper a number of risks has been identified that have already occurred from the study of a number of construction projects completed and theoretical studies and interview a number of construction industry experts to determine the extent of the impact of these risks in each of these three axes in construction projects in Iraq for the purpose of responding and management.


The study found a set of conclusions such as existing of priority in happiness of risks which proof that there is an relationship between the risks and sort of stage, contract and constructional work. In the light of what has been reached for the purpose of benefiting from the computer automated features a program have been used ( Vanguard Software System ) to build the decision tree in order to manage the risks according to their priority in happiness.

The present paper is an experimental study to improve the productivity of the conventional solar still. This done by modifying conventional still in a way that the distilled basin is larger than distillation basin, thus providing an increase in the condensation surface and speeding up the condensation process. Moreover, increase in the dimensions of the distilled base helps coupling reflective panels to the distilled base to reflect incident solar radiation to the distillation basin. For this purpose , two solar stills were made, one conventional designand another made according to the proposed design. The two solar stills were tested during the period from February to July 2009 under varying weather conditions of Basra, Iraq (latitude of 33.33 and longitude of 44.43). Experimental results showed that the modified still gives about 18%-24% higher distillate than the conventional still for the same basin condition.