( SEM News S.FLOHIDA SECTION MEETING
CHICAGO SECTION MEETING
SEM's Southern Florida Gold Coast Section met early this year in a joint meeting with ASM. Twenty-five people attended the dinner and lecture which followed. John A. Harris, Jr., Manager of the Mechanics of Structures Department at Pratt &. Whitney, was the featured speaker. He has been with the company since 1960 when he graduated from Florida State University. In 1985 he was awarded the United Technologies George Mead Medal for Engineering Achievement for his development of the " Retirement for Cause" concept of life management of jet e ngine components. "Retirement for Cause" (RFCJ is a lifecycle management procedure for military fighter gas-turbine engine components, such as fan, compressor and turbine disks. The procedure enables full use of the safe life inherent in each component, as opposed to arbitrary retirement from service of all components at a calculated low-cycle fatigue life. Historically, these components have been retired at the accumulated time (or cycles) where the first fatigue crack in 1000 identical components, all used in an identical manner, could be expected to occur. By definition the n, 99.9 percent of these components were being retired while they still may have had useful life remaining. The RFC approach is based on fracture mechanics and nondestructive evaluation. The USAF recognized the potential of this approach for maintenance/ life cycle cost savings and began development programs in the late 1970's and early 1980's to reduce the concept to practice. The program has been implemented for USAF engine components by the San Antonio Air Logistics Center and is producing considerable savings for the government in reducing parts and service requirements of jet engines. All SEM members and the ir colleagues are invited to attend the Florida Gold Coast section meetings. Please contact Dr. Robert Telischi, Pratt &. Whitney, P.O. Box 109600, W. Palm Beach, FL, 33410-9600; (305) 84D-6537.
SEM's Chicago Section meeting on February 2 began with a tour of the Experimental Mechanics of Materials Laboratory at Illinois Institute of Technology. The tour gave attendees an overview of the research activities in the laboratory. Demonstrations were given on holographic interferometry, new methods in coupling optics and computers, and fracture testing. After the tour and dinner, Cesar A. Sciammarella, Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and Director of the Experimental Mechanics of Material Laboratory at Illinois Institute of Technology, gave a presentation dealing with holographic interferometry and the evolution of this technique as an experimental stress analysis tool. For information about upcoming meetings, call Andy Zander at (312) 8872124.
32 May 1989
"Retirement for Cause" is discussed at S. Florida section meeting.
SHAH HONORED
Surendra P. Shah, professor of civil engineering and director of the ne w Center for Advanced Cement-Based Materials at Northwestern University, will receive the American Concrete Institute's Arthur R. Anderson Award at the group's 1989 spring convention in Atlanta, Ga. The award is for"outstanding contribution to the advancement of knowledge of concrete as a construction material." The Institute's board of directors and personal awards committee cited Shah "for effectively transmitting to the profession the results of his, and others', research on the applications of classical fracture mechanics to concrete and fiber reinforced concrete." A long-time active ACI member, he is a Fellow of ACI and has chaired various Institute committees. Shah is an expert in the fields of concrete, structural engineering and building materials. He has been particularly involved with constitutive relationship, failure and fracture of concrete, nonlinear fracture mechanics applied to rock, fiber reinforced concrete, highstrength concrete, impact and impulsive loading and behavior of concrete structures subjected to seismic excitation. Shah joined the Northwestern faculty in 1981 . He holds a bachelors degree from B. V.M.College in India, a masters degree from Lehigh University and a doctoral degree from Cornell University. Before joining Northwestern, Shah was on the faculty of the University of Illinois-Chicago and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a long time member of SEM.
