Liane Roldo

Emotional Design: Understanding Immaterial Values for the Development of Products

Professional design is a much broader area than simply designing products to fulfill the needs of individuals. According to Sudjic [1], the design goes beyond the obvious meaning of function and purpose of the objects. It is a language used to create objects that can reflect emotional and cultural values. This way, it is believed that industrial companies understand immaterial values inherent to the objects that can be produced so that they can be extended to new markets; these values can be understood through the knowledge of emotional expectations the individuals have about their products. In this context, this article is a experiment that uses some existing methodologies to understand the behavior of a particular group of people, the objects that have the greatest appeal to them, and the strongest connection with their cultural context.

Environmental Friendly Ship Propulsion System: Case of Aft Stern Tube Bearing

Environmental protection is finally an important issue and, due to previous sea contaminations and for economic reasons, merchant fleets are paying more attention to materials selection and to ship design. Taking into consideration that the propulsion system lubrication, whether oil or water, and the consequent lubricant leakage into sea is a critical problem, the present study examines the practicability and the benefits of implementing water lubricated polymer stern tube bearings instead of conventional white metal bearings lubricated by oil. The investigation method is related to a numerical model and a software application based on finite difference method and isoviscous model. Results, based upon data collected from two different types of actual vessels in service, have shown that power loss in polymer bearings is at least 6 times less than in conventional white metal ones indicating that polymer journal bearings are more energy efficient and environmental friendly.