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The six-axis force/torque sensor based on a Y-type structure has the advantages of simple structure, small space volume, low cost and wide application prospects. To meet the overall structural stiffness requirements and sensor performance requirements in robot engineering applications, this paper aims to propose a Y-type six-axis force/torque sensor.

The performance indicators such as each component sensitivities and stiffnesses of the sensor were selected as optimization objectives. The multiobjective optimization equations were established. A multiple quadratic response surface in ANSYS Workbench was modeled by using the central composite design experimental method. The optimal manufacturing structural parameters were obtained by using multiobjective genetic algorithm.

The sensor was optimized and the simulation results show that the overload resistance of the sensor is 200%F.S., and the axial stiffness, radial stiffness, bending stiffness and torsional stiffness are 14.981 kN/mm, 16.855 kN/mm, 2.0939 kN m/rad and 6.4432 kN m/rad, respectively, which meet the design requirements, and the sensitivities of each component of the optimized sensor have been well increased to be 2.969, 2.762, 4.010, 2.762, 2.653 and 2.760 times as those of the sensor with initial structural parameters. The sensor prototype with optimized parameters was produced. According to the calibration experiment of the sensor, the maximum Class I and II errors and measurement uncertainty of each force/torque component of the sensor are 1.835%F.S., 1.018%F.S. and 1.606%F.S., respectively. All of them are below the required 2%F.S.

Hence, the conclusion can be drawn that the sensor has excellent comprehensive performance and meets the expected practical engineering requirements.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: to analyse the diffusion of an innovative policy or service and the factors influencing it through an explorative study of the diffusion of the Bookstart program in Taiwan; and second, to provide an analytical framework for further study of this program.

The study is both empirical and theoretical. It uses data from existing studies and also agencies involved in Bookstart to explain the diffusion of the program. It then draws on theories of policy diffusion and the initial findings of this study to develop an analytical framework for the further study of the diffusion of the Bookstart program.

The Bookstart program, which is designed to promote reading habits for children 0 to 3 years old and to strengthen parent‐children relations, was originally initiated in the UK. It was first introduced into Taiwan in Taichung County in 2003. The paper shows how the program spread throughout Taiwan and indicates the role of the key players in the diffusion, including charitable institutions, local politicians and leaders, local authority agencies, and the Ministry of Education. The paper posits an analytical framework identifying factors which may help to promote or facilitate the diffusion. In this respect, the paper draws on the theoretical literature and also initial evidence from the research so far undertaken. This will guide the research in the next stage of the study.

This explorative study provides an example of the nature, process and direction of the diffusion of a policy or service innovation, and suggests the possible factors promoting or facilitating it, as identified in the initial findings of the research and in the relevant theoretical literature.

This study aims to investigate the impact that knowledge management (KM) capabilities have on school effectiveness in career and technical education (CTE) in Taiwan.

The study adopted a survey research. A total of 439 valid samples were obtained and subsequently verified with structural equation modeling.

The results indicated that KM capabilities consist of two main dimensions, namely, the KM enabler capabilities and the KM process capabilities. The former includes structures, cultures and information technology support, whereas the latter includes acquisitions, storage, sharing and applications. In terms of the relationships among the dimensions of the model structure, the KM enabler capabilities managed to effectively predict the KM process capabilities, and the KM process capabilities managed to effectively predict the perceived school effectiveness.

Based on the results, improvement of the KM enabler capabilities and process capabilities of higher education institutions of CTE is recommended so that their school effectiveness may be improved. Because the participants were not randomly selected, the generalizability of the results should be further examined.

This study encourages practitioners to focus their KM practices on KM enabler capabilities and the KM process capabilities.

The current study provided an insight into and further understanding of the model regarding the relationships among the KM enabler capabilities, the KM process capabilities and the school effectiveness.

Extreme hot environments are prevalent in many occupational settings, and facilities management workers are no exception. Wearing suitable cooling garment is a useful means to alleviate heat strain and improving performance at heat exposure. This paper aims to evaluate the effectiveness and applicability of the cooling vest across four selected fields (i.e. construction, outdoor cleaning and horticulture, kitchen work and work involved manual handling at the airport) and identify the shortcomings of the cooling vest used by the participating workers.

This study adopted a two-phase design: a quantitative questionnaire survey followed by qualitative in-depth interviews.

A remarkable physical strain alleviation (PSA) of 21.1 per cent (14.8 per cent in construction, 18.8 per cent in horticulture and cleaning, 27.4 per cent in kitchen and catering and 26.5 per cent in airport apron service) is achieved by the use of cooling vest in four industries. Despite the success of PSA, several shortcomings of the cooling vest were identified: easily stained color, heavy weight, short cooling time, inflexibility that presents a hazard around moving equipment, lack of industry-specific design, nondurable and thick fabric with poor permeability.

The findings of the current study do not only confirm the effectiveness of the cooling vest in alleviating heat strain and physical strain but also identify the major shortcomings upon which further improvements can be made.

The electric motor and multi-speed transmission hub are essential components for an electric bicycle. Traditionally, these two devices have been designed and manufactured independently. The purpose of this study is to propose a novel electromechanical device that artfully integrates an exterior-rotor brushless permanent-magnet (BLPM) motor into a transmission hub to become a compact structural assembly.

A novel design that integrates a three-phase, 20-pole/18-slot exterior-rotor BLPM motor with a multi-speed transmission hub composed of a six-link, two-degrees-of-freedom (2-DOF) compound planetary gear train (PGT) is presented in this study to overcome inherent drawbacks of existing designs. An analytical approach, based on fundamental circuits, is developed to synthesize the clutching sequences and numbers of teeth of all gears of the PGT.

The integrated device provides six forward speeds, including two underdrives, two direct drives, and two overdrives, as well as two drive modes: the motor-drive mode and the human-drive mode, for electric bicycles. The main feature of the proposed design is the spur gear teeth merged with the pole shoes of the stator to dramatically minimize the detent torque, which is an oscillatory torque that always induces vibration and acoustic noise of the BLPM motor.

The gear teeth on the pole shoes of the stator provide functions not only for transmission, but also act as dummy slots for adjusting the magnetostatic field of the BLPM motor to effectively reduce the detent torque. The peak value of the detent torque of the integrated design is only 9 percent of the original BLPM motor with identical magnet properties and motor dimensions. Such a feature is contributive in suppressing the vibration and acoustic noise of the electric bicycle's BLPM motor. A BLPM motor rated at 310 W and 250 r/min for the integrated device is presented and analyzed by using the commercial finite-element package Ansoft/Maxwell 2D Field Simulator.

This study investigated distributive justice (DJ), procedural justice (PJ) and interactional justice (IJ) in the recovery of service in the hotel industry as well as their effects on post-recovery satisfaction and the subsequent behavior of customers. This study also sought to elucidate the moderating effects of star ratings on these influences.

A field experiment design with 424 consumers using structural equation modeling was adopted to test the study hypotheses.

DJ, PJ and IJ were all shown to have a significantly positive effect on post-recovery satisfaction, which in turn has a significantly positive effect on customer loyalty and significantly negative effect on customer defection. Analysis on the moderating effects of star ratings also revealed that the relationship between DJ and post-recovery satisfaction during recovery efforts is stronger for hotels with higher star ratings than for hotels with lower star ratings. During recovery, post-recovery satisfaction was shown to be more effective in reducing customer defection from hotels with lower star ratings than from hotels with higher star ratings.

This study provides a reference by which hotels can match their service recovery mechanism to their star rating to retain customers and increase customer loyalty in the event of service failure.

This study confirms the importance of IJ in the service recovery processes in the hotel industry and provides verification that the star rating of a hotel plays a crucial role as a moderator between recovery effort and recovery effectiveness.

This study examines how dynamic capabilities (DCs) impact global value chain (GVC) upgrading and assesses the mediating role of innovation.

The study uses a quantitative research method. The data are collected using an online questionnaire administered to respondents working in Chinese automobile manufacturers in China and Laos. The data are analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) and related software.

The results show that DCs and innovation capabilities (ICs) positively affect GVC upgrading and that ICs plays a mediating role between DC and GVC upgrading. Dynamic capabilities evolution (CE) mediates the relationship between DCs, ICs and GVC upgrading. Finally, differences exist in the effects of the three dimensions of DCs on ICs and GVC upgrading.

Focusing on the absorption and transformation of knowledge, enterprises could experience a clear enhancement of IC and CE and be more likely to obtain higher marginal returns. The study provides insights for emerging market firms to gain higher added value in internationalization.

This study demonstrates that different dimensions of DCs have different effects on GVC upgrading. In terms of theory, the impact of IC is considered in terms of the mediating effect of CE on IC. Differences are highlighted concerning the impact of learning capability, integrating and coordinating capability and sensing capability on the mediated relationships.

The analysis of power flow and mechanical efficiency constitutes an important phase in the design and analysis of gear mechanisms. The aim of this paper is to present a systematic procedure for the determination of power flow and mechanical efficiency of epicyclic-type transmission mechanisms.

A novel epicyclic-type in-hub bicycle transmission, which is a split-power type transmission composed of two transmission units and one differential unit, and its clutching sequence table are introduced first. By using the concept of fundamental circuits, the procedure for calculating the angular speed of each link, the ideal torque and power flow of each link, the actual torque and power flow of each link determined by considering gear-mesh losses, and the mechanical efficiency of the transmission mechanism is proposed in a simple, straightforward manner. The mechanical efficiency analysis of epicyclic-type gear mechanisms is largely simplified to overcome tedious and complicated processes of traditionally methods.

An analysis of the mechanical efficiency of a four-speed automotive automatic transmission completed by Hsu and Huang is used as an example to illustrate the utility and validity of the proposed procedure. The power flow and mechanical efficiency of the presented 16-speed in-hub bicycle transmission are computed, and the power recirculation inside the transmission mechanism at each speed is detected based on the power flow diagram. When power recirculation occurs, the mechanical efficiency of the gear mechanism at the related speed reduces. The mechanical efficiency of this in-hub bicycle transmission is more than 96 percent for each speed. Such an in-hub bicycle transmission possesses reasonable kinematics and high mechanical efficiency and is therefore suitable for further embodiment design and detail design.

The proposed approach is suitable for the mechanical efficiency analysis of all kinds of complicated epicyclic-type transmissions with any number of degrees of freedom and facilitates a less-tedious process of determining mechanical efficiency. It is a useful tool for mechanical engineering designers to evaluate the efficiency performance of the gear mechanism before actually fabricating a prototype as well as measuring the numerical data. It also helps engineering designers to cautiously select feasible gear mechanisms to avoid those configurations with power recirculation in the preliminary design stage which may significantly reduce the time for developing novel in-hub bicycle transmissions.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate masculinity in Chinese social media marketing for global luxury fashion brands through two studies.

Study 1 compares physical characteristics of males in visually oriented US (Instagram) and Chinese (Weibo) social media posts promoting global luxury fashion magazine brands (e.g. Vogue, Cosmopolitan, GQ and Esquire). Study 2 examines the prevalence of and Chinese consumers’ responses (reposts, comments and likes) to different masculinities depicted in luxury fashion brand-sponsored Weibo posts.

Male portrayals for Chinese audiences feature more characteristics associated with emerging East Asian hybrid masculinities – “Little Fresh Meat” (LFM) and “Old Grilled Meat” (OGM) – than associated with global or regional hegemonic masculinity (i.e. the scholarly Wén and action-oriented Wu). Wén remains common in social media posts for luxury fashion goods, but LFM and OGM engender more consumer responses.

Chinese luxury fashion marketing depicts masculinity more similarly to other East Asian marketing than to Western marketing. Some luxury fashion brands are struggling for acceptance among Chinese youth. Luxury fashion marketers should incorporate hybrid rather than hegemonic masculinities to prompt more favorable responses among Chinese consumers, especially younger female target markets.

Growing female occupational and consumer power and shifting male employment from blue-collar to white-collar jobs have influenced media portrayals of masculinity. Social media marketing for luxury fashion brands demonstrates the prevalence and appeal of hybrid masculinities in China.