Design Processes
| Design Processes focuses on the skills necessary to create technologies that do not exist or to innovate existing ones. Students learn about topics such as design briefs, orthographic projections, isometric, axonometric, perspective drawings. The students first project is to develop an egg carrier that must carry an egg safely across a string using a DC motor and parts supplied by the instructor. From there, the students must design scale models using both the computer and building a physical model. The students have access to industrial standard programs such as AutoCAD 2002, AutoDesk Inventor 2006, Pro/Desktop 8.0, Pro/Engineer WildFire and 3DsMax 8.0. To view a promotional video of this course, click here. |  |
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The second semester of Design Processes moves into more advanced topics of design such as mechanics, pneumatics, hydraulics, and electronics. The big project second semester is to develop a crane mechanism capable of lifting an object off of the ground and over to another location. The crane must be able to lift a 1000 gram weight (approx. 2 lbs) using only a DC motor. The cranes must be able to work consistently enough to automate the process in the end through robotics. The students use Vernier LabPros and a Digital Control Unit to send commands to either DC motors, stepper motors, or servos. The students use the a computer with RealBasic 2007 or a TI-84 graphing calculator to completely control their cranes motions. After the programming aspect is finished, they will be able to hit enter and the process of motion will be autonomous. The students are then able to add sensors to the robotic crane and have the motions respond to the sensor's input. |