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UPCYCLING OBSOLETE MECHANICAL EQUIPMENT INTO INNOVATIVE LABORATORY TEST RIGS: A LOW-COST SOLUTION OR A SUSTAINABLE DESIGN APPROACH?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 July 2021

Nikolaos Rogkas ,
Eustratios Tsolakis ,
Christos Kalligeros ,
Georgios Vasileiou ,
Christos Vakouftsis ,
Georgios Kaisarlis ,
Angelos P. Markopoulos  and
Vasilios Spitas
Nikolaos Rogkas*
Affiliation:
National Technical University of Athens, School of Mechanical Engineering
Eustratios Tsolakis
Affiliation:
National Technical University of Athens, School of Mechanical Engineering
Christos Kalligeros
Affiliation:
National Technical University of Athens, School of Mechanical Engineering
Georgios Vasileiou
Affiliation:
National Technical University of Athens, School of Mechanical Engineering
Christos Vakouftsis
Affiliation:
National Technical University of Athens, School of Mechanical Engineering
Georgios Kaisarlis
Affiliation:
National Technical University of Athens, School of Mechanical Engineering
Angelos P. Markopoulos
Affiliation:
National Technical University of Athens, School of Mechanical Engineering
Vasilios Spitas
Affiliation:
National Technical University of Athens, School of Mechanical Engineering
*
Rogkas, Nikolaos, National Technical University of Athens, Department of Mechanical Design and Automatic Control, Greece, [email protected]

Abstract

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Circular Economy (CE) and the potential of reusing and recycling the products after the end of their life, becomes imperative for environmental, economic and social reasons. Especially during the 4th Industrial Revolution that is taking place nowadays, an increasing number of out-of-date equipment has to be replaced, which constitutes a chance and necessity to be reused, through recycling, redesigning and remanufacturing. The paper presents proof-of-concept studies regarding upcycling of obsolete and outdated equipment into novel test rigs mainly addressing research activities. Three such case studies are presented, namely the upcycling of an injection moulding machine into a modular test bench for power hydraulic components, the upcycling of scrap components into a hybrid hydraulic/ ICE powertrain rig and the functional augmentation of a gear roll tester to accommodate single and double flank tests. Significant savings in cost, raw materials and time are demonstrated in all cases and adherence to the CE objectives are observed.

Keywords

Circular economyDesign for X (DfX)UpcyclingSustainabilityRetrofitting
Type
Article
Information
Proceedings of the Design Society , Volume 1: ICED21 , August 2021 , pp. 3309 - 3318
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BYCreative Common License - NCCreative Common License - ND
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work.
Copyright
The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

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