Capstone Design Projects at the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at Concordia University (original) (raw)
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This paper reviews some recent major changes made to the Senior Mechanical Engineering Capstone Design Program at UBC. The program now consists of a two-term senior level design sequence where student teams work on open-ended design problems sponsored by outside clients. In order to reinforce relevance and ensure that practices parallel those of industry, the Department recruited local senior engineers to serve as engineering mentors to the students and work in concert with the course instructors. Several milestones were established during the duration of the program year to reinforce good design practice beginning from an agreement on client needs and proceeding through concept generation, selection, analysis and finally ending with prototype construction and evaluation. The paper highlights the improvements made to the program as a result of these changes and presents an example of a student design project developed under the new model.
123rd ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition, 2016
Synergistic Activities • Introduced Computer Aided Design for elementary and middle school children (2005-2009) • Supervised 30+ design/research projects involving 83+ undergraduate students • Hosted numerous outreach programs for 2000+ pre-college students • Combustion Institute KSA Country Chapter founding member • Supervised three annual teams of international design exchange students from France conducting research/design at U of Iowa and Industry • Served as industry liaison between U. of Iowa and HNI Corporation for nine years • Served as a member of industry advisory board for College of Engineering at the U.
Capstone Design Projects: Theory Meets Practice
2020
This paper describes one example of an adjustable gooseneck trailer hitch assembly that was assigned as a senior capstone design project course at Kettering University, Flint, Michigan, USA to carry out their work from concept to testing phases of a real prototype – in short, following “Theory meets practice” concept. Typically at most other engineering colleges, students complete their capstone projects in one year, while at Kettering University, the students complete their capstone courses in one academic term that lasts only about 11 weeks. Using math and advanced Computer Aided Engineering (CAE) tools for analysis is expected. Three different groups of students enrolled in three separate courses over 3 academic terms developed two different trailer hitch devices. The first gooseneck hitch system briefly described here was the effort of a group of four students of the capstone course. They designed a manually adjustable device. However, due to time constraints, their fabricated d...
Industrially Supported Projects In A Capstone Design Sequence
2003 Annual Conference Proceedings
The design experience in the mechanical engineering BS degree program at The University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA) contains a senior-level capstone design course sequence, providing students an opportunity to apply and integrate the knowledge gained throughout the curriculum to the development of an instructor-approved project. The two-semester course sequence provides sufficient time for students to complete a project involving the design of a relatively complex system. In the last few years, representatives from industry have been invited to sponsor design projects. Several manufacturing companies and consulting firms have responded positively and actively participated in funding and mentoring capstone design projects. Engineers employed by these companies have served as project mentors and participated in evaluating the final reports and oral presentations. Industrial participation in our capstone design sequence has provided our students with a unique design experience opportunity. This paper describes the content of the capstone design sequence, provides short descriptions of industrial projects companies, and includes examples of completed design projects.
Using Industry Like Product Development Projects In Mechanical Engineering Capstone Design Courses
2005 Annual Conference Proceedings
A good engineering education involves more than preparing students that have sound technical knowledge in a particular discipline. The undergraduate program needs to provide a comprehensive education that incorporates as many practical experiences as possible. In this regard, a carefully selected product development project sponsored by a company and involving the participation of some of its engineers as mentors, reviewers, and evaluators, can serve to closely emulate industrial practice in a capstone design course. There are many crucial activities and potential pitfalls of such an approach. Initial project selection must be appropriate in scope, involve suitable application of analytical tools, and be containable in time, cost, testing requirements, fabrication capabilities, etc. Substantial resources are required from the industrial partners and care must be taken to address any intellectual property concerns. However, the benefits far outweigh the challenges. Students solve a real industrial problem of interest to the sponsoring company following a structured product development process similar to what they will be expected to do upon graduation. Through interactions with the mentoring engineers, they are coached in many important areas, including corporate and regulatory requirements, design for manufacturing and assembly, etc. This paper will present as a case study a project sponsored by an automaker to develop a hard tonneau cover for a convertible vehicle. We will describe how some of the potential pitfalls were addressed, summarize the process that the students followed, describe the roles of the faculty member and the company personnel involved, and summarize the results obtained and lessons learned.
journal of engineering science and technology, 2016
A capstone project in current engineering education is often introduced to enable the holistic attainment of engineering knowledge by an engineering undergraduate. Essentially project-based in nature, there exists a need to ensure that part of the attainment process involves key industry practices – such practices being necessary in attaining the status of a professional engineer. Herein lies the synergy that can be made use of between industry and academia. By exposing engineering undergraduates to a project which addresses an engineering challenge and providing them with the opportunity to learn from professional engineers who are experts in the fields of safety, sustainability, quality management, ethics and project management, this culminates in the implementation of a prototype design which incorporates the amalgamation of knowledge from industry and academia. This paper presents the unique curriculum developed in a capstone project module, incorporating learning sessions from ...
Capstone Design Projects With Industry
2005 Annual Conference Proceedings
The benefits of company sponsored capstone design projects, both to academia and to industry, have been well established. At Rose-Hulman the benefits to students include the broadening of their engineering skills, the required interaction with practicing engineers, the strengthening of teaming skills by working in design groups, the development of communication skills with required oral and written reports, and the experiences of project management. These projects are "owned and managed" by the student teams with company contacts providing appropriate data and information and with faculty serving as advisors only. The authors have developed and improved these student/industry interactions over the last few years with over 100 students working with 20 to 30 different companies each year. Recently, the authors have placed greater emphases on requiring that the projects use the tools of engineering management in the completion of the projects and in the formal written and oral presentations. ABET 2000 requires that capstone design experiences build on knowledge gained from earlier courses. It is the purpose of this paper to discuss methods for the selection of appropriate projects from industry and then to show how students integrate teaming and project management skills from previous courses during completion of their capstone projects.
Student reflections on capstone design: experiences with industry-sponsored projects
International Journal of Engineering Education, 2014
Students are a primary stakeholder in engineering Capstone Design courses, but the student voice risks being overlooked indiscussions of Capstone Design pedagogy and development. While many engineering programs collect student feedback andperformance data for accreditation purposes, the engineering education and engineering design literature provide few resources thatcapture student perspectives on Capstone Design, especially across multiple institutions. The 2012 Capstone Design Conferencehosted two well-attended panel sessions called ‘‘Student Reflections on Capstone Design’’ specifically to highlight studentexperiences in Capstone Design courses with industry-sponsored projects. Each panel featured four different panelists who hadrecently completed their Capstone Design courses, had worked with different industrial sponsors, and represented differentinstitutions and engineering disciplines. The facilitator of each panel asked the same initial questions of the respective panelists...
Methods Of Assessing Student Learning In Capstone Design Projects With Industry: A Five Year Review
2020
The benefits of company sponsored student design projects, both to academia and to industry, have been well established recently in symposia and in publications. However, assessing these benefits in order to improve the students' experiences can be difficult. This paper discusses techniques of assessment used to improve student learning over the past five years in capstone design courses at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. The student teams work together to create solutions to design problems defined by companies. These projects are "owned and managed" by the student teams with company contacts providing appropriate data and information and with faculty serving as advisors only. Mistakes made by the teams therefore are sometimes inevitable but this is considered to be pedagogically an important lesson in design. The students must interact not only with their company but also with their team mates in order to accomplish team goals. The assessment of these important interactions and the resulting changes to the courses are discussed. Traditionally, design reports alone have been the method by which the students' performance is judged in typical capstone design courses. However, this limits the ability of the faculty to determine the students' interaction with their companies and also with their peers. The desire to evaluate teaming skills as well as technical competence led the authors to investigate different approaches for assessing student learning. In this paper, the authors demonstrate the use of company evaluations, status reports, student self-assessments, peer reviews, and oral reports, as well as design reports to quantify student performance both as team members and design engineers. These methods will be discussed and examples presented showing how the results can be used to improve individual student performance on industrial design projects.