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THE MELTING POT APPROACH TO SENIOR DESIGN

THE MELTING POT APPROACH TO SENIOR DESIGN. Michael A. Latcha, Ph.D. Subramaniam Ganesan, Ph.D. Edward Y.L. Gu, Ph.D. Richard E. Haskell, Ph.D. Reasons for a change of practice. Duplication of effort, different expectations and outcomes between departments Integrate knowledge and skills

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THE MELTING POT APPROACH TO SENIOR DESIGN

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  1. THE MELTING POT APPROACH TO SENIOR DESIGN Michael A. Latcha, Ph.D. Subramaniam Ganesan, Ph.D. Edward Y.L. Gu, Ph.D. Richard E. Haskell, Ph.D.

  2. Reasons for a change of practice • Duplication of effort, different expectations and outcomes between departments • Integrate knowledge and skills • Multidisciplinary teamwork • Accreditation requirements SOLUTION: Schedule all senior engineering design courses together on same days, at same times, with three experienced faculty members

  3. The “Melting Pot” Philosophy • The “Melting Pot” Approach • All engineering disciplines in one room • Student Design Teams • Combining all engineering disciplines to be successful • Choice of Design Project • Non-industrial, multidisciplinary, no experience necessary • Never Answer a Question • The Importance of Competition

  4. Project • Design a kit for Sophomore Design • Upcoming course • Autonomous line-following vehicle that can carry a 15-lb payload along a closed-circuit track up to 300-ft long • Additional functions must be discussed but not necessarily designed • Maximum cost: $150

  5. Competition • Must function on non-straight portion of track with 15-lb payload • Performance measure: fastest adjusted time to traverse course • Can make up to 3 runs, with modifications between • Penalties: • 5 second penalty for hitting obstacles • 1 sec/ft penalty for not finishing course

  6. Week 1 – Introduction • Uncomfortable silence, confusion, wide-eyed looks, disbelief • Describe project and competition to class, establish website as main communication tool • Student profiles to gather information for team assignments • Design teams assigned, work begins

  7. Week 3 – Design proposals • Required before purchases can be made • Level of detail range from minimal to extreme • Current designs have little resemblance to proposed designs • Team activity mainly divided between disciplines with little interdisciplinary communication

  8. Week 8 – Oral Progress Reports • 20-minute PowerPoint presentations • “tell the story” • Every team member speaks • No group had a functioning vehicle • All groups had all necessary components • Much more interdisciplinary activity, CS/ME and EE/CE

  9. Week 12 – Current status • Only one group still has not seen their vehicle follow a line • All other groups are improving speed, accuracy and tracking - 3 weeks early • Most successful groups work and meet as a whole, everyone involved with all aspects • Least successful groups are still passing vehicles between discipline sub-groups

  10. Vehicles

  11. Future project ideas • Autonomous vehicles that: • seek out and park into parallel spaces • seek out and extinguish fires • play sports (shoot baskets) • Teams of inter-communicating vehicles that cooperate to perform a function • Play soccer, marching band • Anything with fire or explosives

  12. Conclusions After April 15, 2004 see http://personalwebs.oakland.edu/~latcha/

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