Engineering Commons^™

Modeling Vibration Stiffness: An Analytical Extension Of Hertzian Theory For Angular Contact Bearings With A Thin Viscoelastic Coating, Davis R. Burton

Honors Theses

This thesis considers the novel angular contact rolling-element bearings proposed by NASA’s Glenn Research Center, which are coated with a thin solid lubricant that exhibits viscoelastic behavior. Current analytical models for the dynamic stiffness matrix of angular contact bearings, critical for vibration analysis, lack the ability to model the effects of a solid coating, as well as the time dependencies inherent in viscoelastic theory. The author first presents an overview of the stiffness matrix derivation, followed by a treatment of the underlying Hertzian contact theory. An analytical extension of this theory is proposed which accounts for a thin elastic layer …

Inverted Pendulum With Swing-Up And Center-Stabilization System Design, Caleb Osmond

Honors Theses

The inverted pendulum is a classic problem for testing control techniques. This paper details the implementation of multiple PID control schemes and the overall design of an inverted pendulum capable of swing-up and center stabilization.

Husker Motorsports Active Drag Reduction System, Creighton Hughes, Evan Killian, Micah Busboom, Aj Johnson, Jude Steffen

Honors Theses

Formula SAE is a multifaceted competition that involves student teams designing and competing with an open-wheel style race car. There are 5 different dynamic events included in the competition. Each event requires a unique aerodynamic setup to have the best performance possible. This design project focuses on a drag reduction system (DRS) that will improve aerodynamic performance, resulting in faster lap times and increased competitiveness. Key features include a direct electronic actuation mechanism that will allow the rear wing to be adjusted during a race. The benefits of the DRS system, include increased speed, improved handling, and greater fuel efficiency …

Stump Grinder Project, Wyatt Hopper

Honors Theses

This project covers the analysis of a Portable Stump Grinder device sponsored by private investors known as Gary and Carol Sherman, two farmers out of Lincoln, Nebraska. The ultimate goal of this project, in terms of the work we were assigned, was to provide the foundation work for future engineering teams to design and build the stump grinder for Gary and Carol Sherman.

Leadership And Project Management In Engineering: Baja Tube Bender, Maysyn Tm Sorensen

Honors Theses

Typical coursework for Undergraduate Mechanical Engineering students does not deeply focus on project management and leadership. Detailed in the following documentation is review of my Mechanical Engineering Senior Design capstone project as well as analysis of final presentations of other capstone projects. The Senior Design capstone projects spanned both semesters of the ‘22-’23 academic school year. After the first semester of my project I produced a post-mortem report to analyze the project’s progress and suggest improvements for the project, design, and team interaction. These improvements were compiled into an action plan and implemented in the spring semester. When the project …

Crafting Comfort: The Design And Production Of A High-End Poolside Lounge Chair, John Hollis Tackett, Robert Griffis

Honors Theses

This report focuses on the development, design, and manufacturing of the Adjustable Lounge Chair, a high-end poolside lounge chair created to address un-met customer demand in the market. The investigation began with a market analysis to identify sought-after features not currently offered by competitors' products. This analysis drove the design of the chair, which was developed using CAD software, followed by the construction of a physical prototype to validate the concept.

The chair's innovative features include adjustable lumbar support and chair height, as well as a removable face-piece that enables users to comfortably lie prone without straining their necks. These …

The Engineering Challenges Of Designing And Manufacturing A Tensegrity Cup Stand, Yaniv Goulet, Daniel Ferro

Honors Theses

Progressing from a simple idea into a fully developed product is one of the main goals of any engineer. Through Haley Barbour Center for Manufacturing Excellence’s capstone program, the team was tasked with realizing a tensegrity cup stand. The tensegrity structure consists of a top and a bottom of some form only supporting itself by tension. The team had to research the concept, create an initial design, create a prototype of the product, improve the design after the prototype’s mistakes, apply lean principles to improve the manufacturing efficiency, and analyze all the economic impacts of the engineering decisions. In the …

Design And Implementation Of Test Stand Upgrades For Investigating Gearset Churning Losses With Baffles, Matthew Martin

Honors Theses

The automotive industry is continually researching ways to decrease energy losses in drivetrain applications. Rotating gear sets in an oil bath suffer frictional losses due to oil churning. The Center for Advanced Vehicle Design and Simulation (CAViDS) consortium has proposed studies to understand and reduce these churning losses. The primary means to reduce these churning losses are to redirect the oil flow using baffles and/or alter the oil viscosity. To perform churning loss optimization under controlled conditions, an existing test stand was upgraded to improve safety, introduce oil temperature control, and allow for the interchange of baffle designs. For safety, …

Jpl Robotic Avionics & Sensor Kit (Rask), John Helzer

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

The Musical Water Fountain, Amy Nielsen

Honors Theses

An affordable musical water fountain was designed over the course of one year. The target consumers for this fountain are middle to upper class homeowners. Based on the design parameters and research found on the topic, the fountain presents an aesthetically pleasing light and water show for residential neighborhoods. The design was sought to be competitive on the market with preexisting fountains. Since it must play music and perform a water and light show all in synchronous, there was confidence in the unique features to sell with today’s consumers. SolidWorks was used extensively to design and model the fountain and …

Elastomer O-Ring Seal Swell Measurements For Sustainable Aviation Fuel Material Compatibility, Conor J. Faulhaber

Honors Theses

As efforts continue to fight climate change by transitioning energy sources away from fossil fuels and towards renewable alternative, the commercial aviation sector finds itself at danger of falling behind in emissions reductions. To combat this, the best term opportunity to reduce the industry’s contribution to greenhouse gas emissions has been identified as sustainable aviation fuel, or SAF, derived from renewable feedstocks like agricultural waste or used cooking oil. Currently, SAF is regulated to a 50%v blending limit with conventional petroleum-based fuel to maintain certain jet fuel properties, including material compatibility with elastomer o-ring seals. When these seals come in …

Enhancing Bifacial Pv Efficiency With The Addition Of A Rear Side Reflector, Neila Watson

Honors Theses

Bifacial photovoltaics are an expanding sector of solar electricity production, collecting solar energy on the front, back, and sides of the module. This increases the efficiency by around 10% to 30% over a typical mono facial cell, which only collects sunlight on the front. However, the performance of bifacial PV arrays depends on a variety of factors, including temperature, shadows, solar insolation, and set-up geometry. The geometry is affected by the tilt angle, the azimuth angle, the height from the ground to the panel, and the reflectance from the ground surface. The addition of a reflector, usually white in color …

Developing New Crutch Tip Design For Overall Increased Stability And Improved Movement On Different Terrains, Lauren Skinner

Honors Theses

Crutches are a mobility assistive device that are often used in various situations, such as post- surgical rehabilitation and recovery after injury. The current crutch tip design that is used on today’s crutches are often unstable and do not provide quality movement on different terrains, such as snow, ice, mud, and wet surfaces. These problems would be solved with a new tip design that could be attached to existing crutches or manufactured with the crutch itself. The team’s solution to this problem is a crutch tip with modular parts. The tip would attach to the shaft of the crutch like …

Interaction Beyond Nearest Neighbor In Periodic Structures, Sudesh Pathak

Honors Theses

Periodic structures have been of particular interest to researchers and engineers due to their interesting vibrational characteristics leading to applications, namely acoustic filters, and waveguides. Many studies on the interaction of nearest neighbors have been performed. However, such studies are insufficient to understand the variation of band gaps and the maximum number of wave vectors for each frequency. The complex band structure obtained from the interaction beyond nearest neighbors can assist in the development of sophisticated acoustic technologies. This paper primarily emphasizes the study of such interactions with the development of mathematical models based on electrostatic forces, supported by the …

Customized Sidearm Case: Leading A Cme Capstone Team From Concept To Production, Robert B. Sharp

Honors Theses

The goal behind this thesis is to document and analyze my performance as the project manager for the Customized Sidearm Case capstone team during the Center for Manufacturing Excellence’s senior capstone experience. The capstone experience begins the fall of students senior year where a select number of product ideas submitted by the students are chosen, and teams are built around these projects. The objective of the project is to walk a product from the concept phase through the entire design process resulting in a full-scale production run during the spring semester. My product pitch of a wooden sidearm case, customized …

Nuclear Energy As A Reliable And Safe Source Of Power Generation, Sarup Dhungana

Honors Theses

There is a high demand of energy for generating civil applicable power in the world and in the USA, correspondingly. The world has been consuming various sources to extract the power to meet its demands. Most of the power sources include renewable and non-renewable sources like fossil fuels, natural gas, coal, water, solar, wind, and nuclear power. Although most of these sources have many advantages in terms of their capacity and cost of production, nuclear power can be categorized as the emerging driving force in the United States and in the world for power generation, because of its reliability and …

Center For Manufacturing Excellence Capstone Project: Sec Rivals Checkers, Ward Winstead

Honors Theses

Each year, the seniors in the Haley Barbour Center for Manufacturing Excellence complete a capstone project. A team comprised of seniors in varying disciplines work to develop a business model focused on producing a specific product. This team, SEC Rivals Checkers, chose to produce wooden checker boards where each half of a board is custom to a specific SEC school. These halves were designed to be interchangeable, so a variety of different combination could be created when utilizing the product. Through initial marketing analysis, cost estimation, prototyping, and process development, the original SEC Rivals Checkers idea was developed into a …

Comparative Analysis And Dynamic Response Of Abs Under Uv Light Degradation Using Shock Tube, Greer Lauber

Honors Theses

The purpose of this study was to examine the dynamic response of acrylonitrile-butadlene-styrene (ABS) when exposed to UV light. Impact-Resistant Easy-to-Form ABS sheets were tested using a Shock Tube. Three samples were tested at no UV light exposure and three were tested after 15 days of being exposed to rapid UV degradation rays. All samples were tested at a shock wave equivalent to 400 psi. The results showed that the UV damaged samples experienced a decrease in strength and energy absorption in comparison to the non-UV damaged samples. The average peak load for the non-UV degraded was 1261.89 Newtons and …

Corrosion Assessment Of Biodegradable Metal Implants For Orthopedic Applications, Wendy B. Reynoso-Diaz

Honors Theses

Magnesium alloys are the most promising materials to be used as biodegradable implants mainly due to their superior biocompatibility and lower specific density compared to other biodegradable metals (i.e., zinc and iron-based alloys). This study is investigating the effect of two different manufacturing methods and purity levels on the corrosion rates of a novel Mg-Zn-Ca-Mn-based alloy. Experimental in vitro corrosion tests were conducted on the biocompatible Mg-Zn-Ca-Mn-based alloy fabricated using conventional casting and hot rolling with low and high purity levels. The experimental research conducted, assessed the corrosion rates of the following Mg-1.2Zn-0.5Ca-0.5Mn-based alloys: Hot Rolled High Purity, As-Cast High …

Multistage Modeling Of Fatigue Of Ti-6al-4v Fabricated By Different Additive Manufacturing Techniques, Lionardo Lado, Saeed Ataollahi, Mohammad J. Mahtabi

Honors Theses

Thanks to its high strength-to-weight ratio and corrosion resistance, Ti-6Al-4V has gained a lot of attention in additive manufacturing (AM) of complex parts with aerospace and medical applications. The realistic loading condition in these applications is mostly cyclic. However, the main challenge with AM of this alloy - and in general AM of metallic parts - is fatigue resistance and durability of the part, which has been reported to be much lower than the conventional materials. In this study, fatigue life performance of three additive manufacturing methods was compared using the Multistage Fatigue model (MSF). MSF model predicts the fatigue …

The Grate Solution: Simplifying Viking Oven Packaging Processes, Megan Jansen

Honors Theses

The following report details work completed to improve the Viking Oven Corporation’s gas oven assembly line. The current state of the line hosts an unreliable system for packaging oven grates. Viking manufactures two types of gas ovens on the same line: open burner and closed burner. These different types require different prepackaged grates to be included in the final assembly area. Viking estimates that the wrong grates are sent to the customer ten percent of the time. The following report presents research, brainstorming, problem-solving techniques, and proposed solutions to the problem. The proposed solution would solve the problem at little …

A Molecular Dynamics Study Of The Laser Sintering Process And Subsequent Mechanical Properties Of Γ-Tial Nanoparticles, Eleanor Dickens

Honors Theses

Using molecular dynamics (MD) simulations, the laser sintering additive manufacturing process is investigated through the observation of γ-TiAl nanoparticles. This process is conducted using both uni-directional chain and stacking configurations. By mimicking the heating process and varying laser sintering parameters such as heating rater, sintering temperature, and particle orientation, the fusion behavior and resulting products are analyzed for both chain and stacking NP patterns. In of single chain cases, it is noticed that slower heating rates and higher melting temperatures yield larger neck growth between each individual particle and thus produce a more stable product. This leads to stronger mechanical …

Electromagnetically Propelled Garage Door, Connor Seifert

Honors Theses

Garage door systems are loud and energy inefficient given their many contact points and need for continual maintenance. Most garage door systems use a loud, bulky electric motor to pull the garage door up and down using a chain. To reduce noise and energy loss due to friction from the electric motor and chain, electromagnetic forces used in Electromagnetic Suspension (EMS) trains were researched and adapted to a garage door system. The electromagnetically propelled garage door (EPGD) system was designed and validated using SOLIDWORKS and ANSYS simulation with significantly less contact points due to non-contact electromagnetic propulsion (EMP). The design …

Fsae Vehicle Instrumentation And Validation, Alexander Anthony

Honors Theses

Formula SAE is a student chapter of the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE). Each year SAE hosts a collegiate competition for teams of university students to design, build, and compete with a formula-style vehicle. Students from all around the world collaborate to engineer and manufacture a competition worthy racecar. Each component of the vehicle is designed from scratch, using calculated load cases to optimize weight and strength. Once the car is built, students will test and validate their vehicle. Not every team has the opportunity to validate the critical load cases the vehicle is designed around. This senior design project …

Thermal & Efficiency Analysis For A High-Speed Gearbox, Austin Owen

Honors Theses

The aim of this project was to design and build a test stand to validate a thermal model of a high-speed gearbox developed by Western Michigan University’s (WMU) Center for Advanced Vehicle Design and Simulation (CAViDS) consortium. At the completion of this project, the experimental results measured from tests will be compared to those from a Siemens Amesim model of the same gearbox. For these tests, an electric inverter/motor/gearbox package was connected to an intermediate transmission for the purpose of output speed matching to an electric dynamometer. This dynamometer applied a load to the motor/gearbox to replicate its designed running …

A Computer Vision-Based Method For Bolt Loosening Detection, Savannah Burdette

Honors Theses

Routine bolt-loosening inspection plays an essential role in managing and preventing the degradation of our nation’s highway bridges over time. Neglecting to perform these inspections could result in public safety concerns. The study of this thesis develops a cost-effective method of bolt-loosening detection based on computer vision. To this end, two input images of the bolted connections are collected at two different inspection times. The feature points are then identified from the input images, based on which a geometric transformation matrix is applied to correct any perspective differences between the two images. Next, we select the image patches of the …

Thermal Simulation Of Additive Manufacturing From G-Code, Noah Foster

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Dynamic Design And Simulation Of Mechanical Baseball Launcher, Camille Wetekamm

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Analytical, Numerical, And Computational Simulation Of The Free Convection Cooling Of An Electronics Enclosure For Assistive Painting Device, Jack Clement

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

The Effect Of Store-To-Store Energy Transfers On The Global Dynamics Of Aircraft, Guilherme Mainieri Eymael

Honors Theses

This study analyzes the energy transfer mechanisms when nonlinear devices (stores) are attached to a linear model airplane. For that, a reduced-order model (ROM) was derived to simulate the first two flexible modes of vibration of the primary structure (aircraft) with one store in each wing. Each store can either be locked or unlocked. When locked, it only contributes as mass-effect, and when unlocked, it adds nonlinearity to the system. Simulations were then performed with either both stores locked, one store unlocked, or both stores unlocked. It was found that the attachment of nonlinear stores in the ROM changes the …