COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING

PUTRAJAYA CAMPUS
FINAL EXAM
SEMESTER 2 2014/2015
PROGRAMME

: Bachelor of Electrical and Electronics Engineering (Honours)/

Bachelor of Electrical Power Engineering (Honours)/
Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering (Honours)/
Bachelor of Computer and Communication Engineering (Honours)

SUBJECT CODE

: COEB223

SUBJECT

: Numerical Methods for Engineers

DATE

: February 2015

TIME

: 3 hours

INSTRUCTIONS TO CANDIDATES:
1.

This paper contains FIVE (5) questions in SEVEN (7) pages

2.

Answer ALL questions.

3.

Write all answers in the answer booklet provided.

4.

Write answer to each question on a new page.

5.

Formula booklet is provided. Students are not allowed to write anything in this
booklet.

THIS QUESTION PAPER CONSISTS OF SEVEN (7) PRINTED PAGES INCLUDING

THIS COVER PAGE.

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COEB223 Semester 2 2014/2015

This page is intentionally left blank

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COEB223 Semester 2 2014/2015

QUESTION 1 [20 marks]

An engineer working for a utility company has been assigned to forecast the population of a
small community on the outskirts of a city in order to anticipate the demand for power. Table
below shows the population study of the city over a 20-year period.

Time, t (year)
Population, P (people)

10

15

20

100

200

450

950

2000

It is known that the above data can be represented by a general quadratic equation

 =   +  +
, where A, B and C constants.

a) Using the quadratic regression, solve for the constants A, B, and C and forecast the
population 5 years into the future.
[14 marks]

b) From the quadratic equation obtained in part (a), apply bracketing method to
estimate the number of years for the city population to increase from 100 people at the
beginning of the study to 500 people. Use initial guesses of 10 and 15. Perform
iteration until error of approximation,  is less than 5.0%
[6 marks]

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COEB223 Semester 2 2014/2015

QUESTION 2 [20 marks]

A balloon rocket is a balloon filled with air, and is widely used as a teaching device to
demonstrate simple physics such as the Newtons third law. A typical setup for such
experiment consists of the balloon, a string, a drinking straw and adhesive tape. The string is
threaded through the straw and is attached at a doorknob on one end, and a chair 20 m away
on the other. The straw is then taped to the side of the air-filled balloon, with the open end of
the balloon touching the chair. When the balloon is released, the thrust from the opening
propels it along the length of the string.
In one of the experiments, the velocity of the balloon rocket was measured using a ballistic
chronograph at different period of times, and the results are tabulated in the following table:

Time,  (s)

0.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

1.2

1.4

1.6

1.8

Velocity,  (m/s)

0.00

3.45

7.43

9.12

9.45

8.45

7.35

5.87

3.34

0.00

a) Using the finite divided difference formulas of   order, determine the
instantaneous acceleration of the balloon rocket at each time steps.

[10 marks]

b) Using suitable Simpsons rules, determine the total distance travelled by the balloon
rocket when it started to slow down (i.e. having negative acceleration) until it has
finally stopped.

[10 marks]

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COEB223 Semester 2 2014/2015

QUESTION 3 [20 marks]

To investigate the temperature effect of the very high current flowing in a single core copper
wire, two heat sources with constant temperature are connected to the both ends of a straight
28 meters copper wire. There are 3 points marked with equal length on the wire to study the
change in temperature at different locations after 20 minutes, t=20 min. Given that the
thermal conductivity of the copper wire,  = 353.1


.

.The initial temperature of each point

is measured in Kelvin (K) and are given in the figure below.

28 m

A
T= 200
K

B
T= 200
K

Heat source
1

C
T= 200
K
Heat source
2

Using the Simple Implicit Method, solve for the temperature distribution along points A, B
and C after 20 min with a step size of 10 min. Use the standard LU decomposition method
to solve for the system of equations obtained from the Simple Implicit Method.

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COEB223 Semester 2 2014/2015

QUESTION 4 [20 marks]

Humanitarian Care Bhd (MyCare) is determined to raise their funds by selling t-shirts that
profits RM6, RM5, and RM4 for each type-A, type-B, and type-C t-shirts that it plans to
produce. To produce a type-A t-shirt requires 2 minutes on machine I, 1 minute on machine
II, and 2 minutes on machine III. A type-B t-shirt requires 1 minute on machine I, 3 minutes
on machine II, and 1 minute on machine III. A type-C t-shirt requires 1 minutes on machine I
and 2 minutes on each of machines II and III. There are 3 hours available on machine I, 5
hours available on machine II, and 4 hours available on machine III for manufacturing these
t-shirts each day. By using SIMPLEX method, determine the amount of t-shirts of each type
should MyCare make per day in order to maximize its profit?
[20 marks]

QUESTION 5 [20 marks]

A spring with a mass of 1kg has natural length, m. A force of 2.5N is required to maintain it
stretched to a length of 50cm. Solution from Hookes Law, the force required to stretch the
spring is
 = 

By using the value of the spring constant, k thru Hookes Law together with mass of 1kg at
initial velocity 0m/s, the motion of spring-mass system is described in the following ordinary
equation:
  

  2 + 
= 0


Use the Midpoint method with a step size of 0.5 to calculate the total distance moved by the
spring and its velocity at time 2.5seconds. Assume zero initial velocity and distance travelled.

-END OF QUESTION PAPER-

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