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The purpose of this paper is to classify different conditions of the rolling element bearing (REB) using vibration signals acquired from a customized bearing test rig.

An effort has been made to develop health index (HI) based on singular values of the statistical features to classify different conditions of the REB. The vibration signals from the normal bearing (N), bearing with defect on ball (B), bearing with defect on inner race (IR) and bearing with defect on outer race (OR) have been acquired from a customized bearing test rig under variable load and speed conditions. These signals were subjected to “modified kurtosis hybrid thresholding rule” (MKHTR)-based denoising. The denoised signals were decomposed using discrete wavelet transform. A total of 17 statistical features have been extracted from the wavelet coefficients of the decomposed signal.

Singular values of the statistical features can be effectively used for REB classification.

REB are critical components of rotary machinery right across the industrial sectors. It is a well-known fact that critical bearing failures causes major breakdowns resulting in untold and most expensive downtimes that should be avoided at all costs. Hence, intelligently based bearing failure diagnosis and prognosis should be an integral part of the asset maintenance and management activity in any industry using rotary machines.

It is found that singular values of the statistical features exhibit a constant value and accordingly can be assigned to each type of bearing fault and can be used for fault characterization in practical applications. The effectiveness of this index has been established by applying this to data from Case Western Reserve University data base which is a standard bench mark data for this application. HIs minimizes the computation time when compared to fault diagnosis using soft computing techniques.

The case is written based on general experience.

Zealvita is a challenger brand to NutriMalt in the white malted food drink (MFD) category. It has a product formula that compares favorably on taste and equally on nutrition. However, Zealvita is not able to translate the power product formula to a winning market formula. Drawing on its legacy and strong adoption route, NutriMalt built a dominant 88% market share in the White MFD category. The market rule of “disproportionate market share for the leading brand” applies with inexorable force in MFD. Smarting at the low market share, Zealvita is in search of a marketing strategy to create churn. Rajiv Product Manager of Zealvita believes that consumer sales promotion of a higher order and at a higher frequency than what is normal can tilt the scales. From Zealvita’s perspective is there a strategic advantage in operating consumer promotion? Is it safe to assume that NutriMalt will not retaliate with consumer promotion? Can consumer sales promotion be sustained at planned frequency? What is the logic in a continuous consumer promotion program?

This case can be used at the post-graduate level in the Marketing Strategy course or in a course that has a sales promotion management or competition management segment. This case is also appropriate for use in executive education programs.

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The purpose of this study is to analyze an unsteady MHD Darcy flow of nonNewtonian hybrid nanoliquid past an exponentially accelerated vertical plate under the influence of velocity slip, Hall and ion slip effects in a rotating frame of reference. The fluids in the flow domain are assumed to be viscously incompressible electrically conducting. Sodium alginate (SA) has been taken as a base Casson liquid. A strong uniform magnetic field is applied under the assumption of low magnetic Reynolds number. Effect of Hall and ion-slip currents on the flow field is examined. The ramped heating and time-varying concentration at the plate are taken into consideration. First-order homogeneous chemical reaction and heat absorption are also considered. Copper and alumina nanoparticles are dispersed in base fluid sodium alginate to be formed as hybrid nanoliquid.

The model problem is first formulated in terms of partial differential equations (PDEs) with physical conditions. Laplace transform method (LTM) is used on the nondimensional governing equations for their closed-form solution. Based on these results, expressions for nondimensional shear stresses, rate of heat and mass transfer are also determined. Graphical presentations are chalked out to inspect the impacts of physical parameters on the pertinent physical flow characteristics. Numerical values of the shear stresses, rate of heat and mass transfer at the plate are tabulated for various physical parameters.

Numerical exploration reveals that a significant increase in the secondary flow (i.e. crossflow) near the plate is guaranteed with an augmenting in Hall parameter or ion slip parameter. MHD and porosity have an opposite effect on velocity component profiles for both types of nanoliquids. Result addresses that both shear stresses are strongly enhanced by the Casson effect. Also, hybrid nanosuspension in Casson fluid (sodium alginate) exhibits a lower rate of heat transfer than usual nanoliquid.

This model may be pertinent in cooling processes of metallic infinite plate in bath and hybrid magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) generators, metallurgical process, manufacturing dynamics of nanopolymers, magnetic field control of material processing, synthesis of smart polymers, making of paper and polyethylene, casting of metals, etc.

The originality of this study is to obtain an analytical solution of the modeled problem by using the Laplace transform method (LTM). Such an exact solution of nonNewtonian fluid flow, heat and mass transfer is rare in the literature. It is also worth remarking that the influence of Hall and ion slip effects on the flow of nonNewtonian hybrid nanoliquid is still an open question.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the antecedents of customer satisfaction during mortgage purchases. Mortgage demand in the USA has reached an all-time high because of an increase in housing demand after COVID-19. Nonetheless, several customers are dissatisfied with their service providers. Customers who actively search the market gain more information about mortgage providers and use this information to define expectations for lenders. The only way there will be customer satisfaction is if lenders meet these expectations. Therefore, it is economically significant for mortgage lenders to discover the antecedents of mortgage satisfaction.

In this study, the partial least squares approach was used to test the hypothesis that satisfaction was influenced by objective knowledge, familiarity and search intensity among a sample of customers (n = 4,512) from the National Survey of Mortgage Originations who had purchased a mortgage in the USA between 2019 and 2020.

The results of structural modelling showed that familiarity (β = 0.23 and p = 0.01) with and knowledge (β = 0.16 and p = 0.01) of mortgages significantly affected consumer satisfaction during mortgage purchase. Search intensity (p = 0.01) mediated the relationship between knowledge, familiarity and satisfaction.

The primary implication is that mortgage service providers should prioritise educating customers about the mortgage buying process on their websites and in person. So managers must actively assist clients in having realistic expectations. Second, mortgage companies should establish a presence on third-party mortgage comparison websites to ensure that customers actively consider alternatives, thereby increasing customer satisfaction.

This study is unique in being an exploratory study to examine the antecedents of mortgage satisfaction using a public data set. This study uniquely examines the National Survey of Mortgage Originations data set with partial least squares approach to examine underlying customer attitudes.

The purpose of this paper is to deal with an unsteady natural convection flow of a rotating fluid past an exponential accelerated vertical plate. The effect of Hall current, ion-slip and magnetic field is considered. Two types of plate temperature, namely, uniform and ramped temperature are considered to model heat transfer analysis.

The Laplace transform technique is employed to find the closed form solutions for velocity, temperature and concentration.

The effects of flow governing parameters on the velocity profile, temperature profile, concentration profile, skin friction, Nusselt and Sherwood numbers are discussed and presented through graphs and tables. It is found that fluid velocity in the primary flow direction decreases with the increase in the magnetic parameter.

First time in the literature, the authors obtained closed form solution to natural convection flow of a rotating fluid past an exponential accelerated vertical plate.

In various kinds of materials processes, heat and mass transfer control in nuclear phenomena, constructing buildings, turbines and electronic circuits, etc., there are numerous problems that cannot be enlightened by uniform wall temperature. To explore such physical phenomena researchers incorporate non-uniform or ramped temperature conditions at the boundary, the purpose of this paper is to achieve the closed-form solution of a time-dependent magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) boundary layer flow with heat and mass transfer of an electrically conducting non-Newtonian Casson fluid toward an infinite vertical plate subject to the ramped temperature and concentration (RTC). The consequences of chemical reaction in the mass equation and thermal radiation in the energy equation are encompassed in this analysis. The flow regime manifests with pertinent physical impacts of the magnetic field, thermal radiation, chemical reaction and heat generation/absorption. A first-order chemical reaction that is proportional to the concentration itself directly is assumed. The Rosseland approximation is adopted to describe the radiative heat flux in the energy equation.

The problem is formulated in terms of partial differential equations with the appropriate physical initial and boundary conditions. To make the governing equations dimensionless, some suitable non-dimensional variables are introduced. The resulting non-dimensional equations are solved analytically by applying the Laplace transform method. The mathematical expressions for skin friction, Nusselt number and Sherwood number are calculated and expressed in closed form. Impacts of various associated physical parameters on the pertinent flow quantities, namely, velocity, temperature and concentration profiles, skin friction, Nusselt number and Sherwood number, are demonstrated and analyzed via graphs and tables.

Graphical analysis reveals that the boundary layer flow and heat and mass transfer attributes are significantly varied for the embedded physical parameters in the case of constant temperature and concentration (CTC) as compared to RTC. It is worthy to note that the fluid velocity is high with CTC and lower for RTC. Also, the fluid velocity declines with the augmentation of the magnetic parameter. Moreover, growth in thermal radiation leads to a declination in the temperature profile.

The proposed model has relevance in numerous engineering and technical procedures including industries related to polymers, area of chemical productions, nuclear energy, electronics and aerodynamics. Encouraged by such applications, the present work is undertaken.

Literature review unveils that sundry studies have been carried out in the presence of uniform wall temperature. Few studies have been conducted by considering non-uniform or ramped wall temperature and concentration. The authors are focused on an analytical investigation of an unsteady MHD boundary layer flow with heat and mass transfer of non-Newtonian Casson fluid past a moving plate subject to the RTC at the plate. Based on the authors’ knowledge, the present study has, so far, not appeared in scientific communications. Obtained analytical solutions are verified by considering particular cases of the published works.

This paper aims to assess the effectiveness of Hall currents and power-law slip condition on the hydromagnetic convective flow of an electrically conducting power-law fluid over an exponentially stretching sheet under the effect of a strong variable magnetic field and thermal radiation. Flow formation is developed using the rheological expression of a power-law fluid.

The nonlinear partial differential equations describing the flow are transformed into the nonlinear ordinary differential equations by employing the local similarity transformations and then solved numerically by an effective numerical approach, namely, fourth-order Runge–Kutta integration scheme, along with the shooting iteration technique. The numerical solution is computed for different parameters by using the computational software MATLAB bvp4c. The bvp4c function uses the finite difference code as the default. This method is a fourth-order collocation method. The impacts of thermophysical parameters on velocity and temperature distributions, skin friction coefficients and Nusselt number in the boundary layer regime are exhibited through graphs and tables and deliberated with proper physical justification.

Our investigation conveys that Hall current has an enhancing behavior on velocity profiles and reduces skin friction coefficients. An increase in the power-law index is observed to deplete velocity and temperature evolution. The temperature for the pseudo-plastic (shear-thinning) fluid is relatively higher than the corresponding temperature of the dilatant (shear-thickening) fluid. The streamlines are more distorted and have low intensity near the surface of the sheet for the dilatant fluid than the pseudo-plastic fluid.

The study is pertinent to the expulsion of polymer sheet and photographic films, hydrometallurgical industry, electrically conducting polymer dynamics, magnetic material processing, solutions and melts of polymer processing, purification of molten metals from nonmetallic. The results obtained in this work can be relevant in fluid mechanics and heat transfer applications.

The present problem has, to the authors' knowledge, not communicated thus far in the scientific literature. A comparative study with the published works is conducted to verify the accuracy of the present study. The results obtained in this analysis are significant in providing the standards for validating the accuracies of some numerical or empirical methods.

In the present investigation, hydromagnetic boundary layer flow of Walters’-B fluid over a vertical porous surface implanted in a porous material under the action of a strong external applied magnetic field and rotation is presented. In several industrial applications, the external applied magnetic field is strong enough to produce Hall and ion-slip currents. Thus, the influence of Hall and ion-slip currents is also considered in this analysis. The flow through configuration is generated because of time varying motion of the free-stream and buoyancy action.

Regular perturbation scheme is used to obtain the solution of the system of coupled partial differential equations representing the mathematical model of the problem. Numerical computation has been performed to notice the change in flow behavior and the numerical results for velocity field, temperature field, species concentration, skin friction, rate of heat and mass transfer are presented through graphs and tables.

An important fact noticed that the exponential time varying motion of the free-stream induces reverse flow in the direction perpendicular to the main flow. Rising values of the strength of the applied magnetic field give increment in the fluid velocity in the neighbourhood of the vertical surface, this may cause because of the exponential motion of the free-stream. The behaviour of the Darcian drag force is similar as magnetic field on fluid flow.

In literature, very less research works are available on Walters’-B fluid where unsteadiness in the system occurs because of time varying motion of the free-stream. In this paper, the authors have made an attempt to study the action of Hall and ion-slip currents, rotation and external applied magnetic field on hydromagnetic boundary layer flow of Walters’-B fluid over a vertical surface implanted in a porous material.

The purpose of this paper is to deal with large deformation analysis of plane beams composed of functionally graded (FG) elastic material with a variable Poisson’s ratio.

The material is assumed to be linear elastic, with a Poisson’s ratio varying according to a power law along the thickness direction. The finite element used is a plane beam of any-order of approximation along the axis, and with four transverse enrichment schemes, which can describe constant, linear, quadratic and cubic variation of the strain along the thickness direction. Regarding the constitutive law, five materials are adopted: two homogeneous limiting cases, and three intermediate FG cases. The effect of both finite element kinematics and distribution of Poisson’s ratio on the mechanical response of a cantilever is investigated.

In accordance with the scientific literature, the second scheme, in which the transverse strain is linearly variable, is sufficient for homogeneous long (or thin) beams under bending. However, for FG short (or moderate thick) beams, the third scheme, in which the transverse strain variation is quadratic, is needed for a reliable strain or stress distribution.

In the scientific literature, there are several studies regarding nonlinear analysis of functionally graded materials (FGMs) via finite elements, analysis of FGMs with constant Poisson’s ratio, and geometrically linear problems with gradually variable Poisson’s ratio. However, very few deal with finite element analysis of flexible beams with gradually variable Poisson’s ratio. In the present study, a reliable formulation for such beams is presented.

The aim of the article is to ascertain the challenges, lessons learned and managerial implications in the deployment of Lean Six Sigma (LSS) competitiveness to micro, small and medium Enterprises (MSME) in India and to establish doctrines to strengthen the initiatives of the government.

The research adopts the Action Research methodology to develop a case study, which is carried out in the printing industry in a Tier III city using the LSS DMAIC (Define-Measure-Analyze-Improve-Control) approach. It utilizes LSS tools to deploy the strategy and to unearth the challenges and success factors in improving the printing process of a specific batch of a product.

The root cause for the critical to quality (CTQ) characteristic, turn-around-time (TAT) is determined and the solutions are deployed through the scientifically proven data-based approach. As a result of this study, the TAT reduced from an average of 1541.2–1303.36 min, which in turn, improved the sigma level from 0.55 to 2.96, a noteworthy triumph for this MSME. The company realizes an annual savings of USD 12,000 per year due to the success of this project. Top Management Leadership, Data-Based Validation, Technical Know-how and Industrial Engineering Knowledge Base are identified as critical success factors (CSFs), while profitability and on-time delivery are the key performance indicators (KPIs) for the MSME. Eventually, the lessons learned and implications indicate that LSS competitiveness can be treated as quality management standards (QMS) and quality tools and techniques (QTT) to ensure competitive advantage, sustainable green practices and growth.

Even though the findings and recommendations of this research are based on a single case study, it is worth noting that the case study is executed in a Tier III city along with novice users of LSS tools and techniques. This indicates the applicability of LSS in MSME and thus, the modality adopted can be further refined to suit the socio-cultural aspects of India.

This article illustrates the deployment of LSS from the perspective of novice users, to assist MSME and policymakers to reinforce competitiveness through LSS. Moreover, the government can initiate a scheme in line with LSS competitiveness to complement the existing schemes based on the findings of the case study.