Brake Design - an Object-Oriented Approach

An object-oriented approach methodology is presented in this work that was applied in developing the computer software for the analysis and design of brakes. This was done using Microsoft Visual Basic (object-oriented) programming language. In designing the software, the various classes of brakes were considered. The mathematical expressions that govern the relationship between force, torque, pressure, heat generated and energy were assembled and carefully programmed. To enhance the ability to visually display and interpret the solutions obtained, graphical features were incorporated in the software. Benchmark problems were used to test the software's robustness, accuracy and efficiency. The results show that the software is highly accurate, efficient and robust. The usage of the software greatly increases the accuracy, and reduces the complexity and time spent in the analysis and design of brakes.