The number of wireless networks has increased rapidly among both home users and companies in just a few years. That has brought a lot of good things with it, for example the possibility to connect wireless equipment to the network or Internet from an arbitrary position within range of the accesspoint. But since the transmissions take place through the air some new security risks appear. It?s difficult to restrict the signals to a specific space and thereby a lot easier for unauthorized to eavesdrop or disturb the signals compared to a traditional wired network.

VBG Produkter AB is a process-orientated company that develops, manufactures and markets trailer couplings with belonging coupling equipment, protection equipment against skidding and stands for wagon-bridge for heavy vehicles. The company feels that their set-up time in production for couplings is not at an acceptable level. Due to high demands of customer oriented production the intermediate stock level of included products within the assembly of couplings has gradually increased which has resulted in high inventory holding costs. VBG Produkter applies Kanban in their production, therefore it is important to produce exactly the necessary amount and avoid overproduction. The objective of this project is to suggest appropriate solutions so that VBG Produkter is able to reduce their set-up time in assembly of couplings, by identifying internal and external set-up time for the chosen process bushing cell.

In today's society, the availability of energy plays an integral part in our everyday lives. Unfortunately, the price of energy in Sweden has increased in recent decades. A large part of our energy consumption goes to heating modules for houses, where heating methods that depend on energy sources such as electricity, district heating, fuel oil, gas and biofuels are the most common ones. During the winter period, the increase in energy costs becomes significantly evident, especially for small property owners. This increase in energy cost is most noticeable for home owners with electric heating.This thesis is written at the Halmstad University, in cooperation with a company, which makes parts of this thesis confidential.

Building Automation Systems in commercial buildings are often designed and installed by different contractors, using equipment and components from different manufacturers. The lack of an accepted communication standard has resulted in a few different standards. Many manufacturers of building automation systems only support one, a few or none of these standards, while developing proprietary system solutions. Regin, who develop such equipment, are planning to adopt an open communication protocol specially designed for building automation - BACnet. As a step in that direction this thesis was announced with the purpose to investigate the possibility to implement BACnet in one of their products and to gain more knowledge of the BACnet protocol.

An increasing number of automotive supplier companies are investing in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) in order to gain cost advantages. This has happened in a rapid pace since many of these countries did not have any foreign direct investments (FDI) at the turn of the century. The problem now is for how long these countries will be able to maintain the low costs. One purpose was to create a model of country advantages for automotive supplier companies when relocating further production to CEE. This dissertation was written in cooperation with the Trelleborg Group.

In this thesis a possible cost effective runner change of some of the units in the hydroelectric power station Olidan is investigated. The possibility to drive a unit at the same efficiency point through a change of the turbine shaft speed and the rate of discharge is tested. Furthermore the theories behind model testing, determination of efficiency increase from model to prototype and efficiency measurements shall be discussed and analyzed with Olidan as a starting point.A predicted curve has been built on information from model tests and field measurements on the existing runners and runner data from the test of the new model. The predicted curve shows the difference in efficiency between an existing runner and a modern one. It is the difference in efficiency that is used in the calculations that are to show whether changing to a pair of new runners will be cost effective or not.

This Master Thesis describes how a concept for a new fly fishing reel has been developed. Thethesis has been an interwork with Loop Tackle Design, which is a leading company in the flyfishing industry with their high-quality products. Loop designs and develops all types of flyfishing equipment like fly fishing reels, rods, lines and clothes.The purpose of this thesis is to generate a concept for a new type of fly fishing reel. The new flyfishing reel shall be innovative and reduce the number of components in fly fishing equipment.The solution for this is to create a fly fishing reel that is collapsible and can be used for all typesof fly fishing.The thesis started with a history of fly fishing and the equipments that have been used for flyfishing in the past and what is used today, in order to get an idea how fly fishing haveprogressed. A frame of reference was then compiled to get an idea of the forces and surroundingsa fly fishing reel will be exposed to.

Forest biomass is becoming an increasingly important source of renewable energy, and thereby the demand is increasing. There is currently 213 000 km of forest roads in Sweden that could be suitable for biomass harvesting. Harvest of biomass along forest roads both provides biomass and maintains the quality of the roads. Currently, the volume of biomass along roads can only be assessed post harvest, chipping and industry deliverance. As the decision of whether or not to harvest should preferably be based on more than experience, the TJ-method has been proposed. The TJ-method is a subjective method to quickly determine the dry matter quantity with the assessment being conducted from the roadside.

Due to a growing interest in communication in today?s society the demand for equipment that is used in communication networks increases while the competition between companies that produce this equipment grows. To meet the increasing demand and at the same time having a competitive product development many companies use some effective product design, such as the modular product design. When a modular product design is used it?s good to compare different module configurations for a certain product and to simplify these comparisons some tool can be used.

Title: What drives the customer's choice of packaging and which factors influence the customer's packaging cost? ? in the automotive and manufacturing industriesAuthor: Lena AnderssonSupervisors: Annika Olsson, Division of Packaging Logistics, Lund Institute of TechnologyHelena Claesson, Volvo Logistics ABProblem: Which parameters are important for logistic people to think of when they are going to choose a package?Which cost factors are included in the packaging cost?What kind of added value can an emballage supplier provide their services with?Purpose: The purpose of the project was to study the parameters that drives the customer's choice of packaging and the factors that influence the total packaging cost. The study also consists of a valuation of what an emballage supplier can offer to add value to their services.Method: The study is based on interviews with people who are working at Volvo Logistics and Volvo Car Corporation. Volvo Logistics provide their customers with standard packaging material, which they own and administrate. Volvo Car Corporation is one of their customers.

This paper examines the reasons behind firms considering backsourcing. While firms experience problems with their outsourcing activities, backsourcing emerges as an alternative solution. Firms primarily take cost considerations into account when reconsidering their outsourcing practices, but this only scratches the surface. A deeper analysis is needed, since cost increases arise from issues such as quality defects and cooperation problems. Even though production costs are low, outsourcing always implies transaction costs.

This project was started within the Market-Design programme of Elforsk, with the aim of developing representative test systems of Swedish distribution networks. Using such test systems as a basis for reliability and customer interruption cost calculations makes it feasible to analyse the network tariff regulation of Swedish power  istribution companies. In particular, it enables studies of the incentives for companies to invest in system reliability. Until now, the available test systems are either not representative of Swedish conditions, or too small in scale and limited in function.Within this project we have created two test systems. In order to represent the diversity of actual Swedish distribution networks, we have created one test system for urban environments and another for rural environments.

Syftet med examensarbetet är att ta fram förbättringsförslag som höjer leveranssäkerheten för transmissioner och axlar vid Volvo Construction Equipment Components (CMP) i Eskilstuna. För att möjliggöra detta har en tydlig bild över företagets situation idag skapats. Enligt kunderna anser CMP vara en av de sämsta leverantörerna, vilket verifierades när den genomsnittliga leveranssäkerheten uppmättes till 30% i den utförda undersökningen. Den dåliga leveranssäkerheten är till stor del egengenererad och skapas genom en ond cirkel av länkade problemområden. Den onda cirkeln börjar med dålig leveranssäkerhet vilket medför svängningar i produktionen som förstärks genom sättet att planera och anskaffa material.

The economic analysis of building contracts is an unexplored field within Law and Economics. This paper makes an attempt to cast some light over the subject and encourage to more research within the field. The main purpose has been to describe why the actual price in a public construction project often turns out to be higher than the contract price and offer a way of handle that risk. In the paper a model is set up that shows an optimal contract given expectations on actual price and gaps in contracts. Cost increases for the buyer can mainly be explained by two situations.

Game balance can be considerd complex - there are many factors that play a role in the perception of balance. This thesis examines complexity, game theory and intution in an effort to disconver more about the perception of balance. The findings are that tactical and strategical choices that are presented for a player need to be interesting, not to complex and not to obvious. The importance lies in the estimation of the result that the player does when making a choice..