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Mechanical Engineering

Union College

Honors Theses

Theses/Dissertations

Design

Articles 1 - 7 of 7

Full-Text Articles in Engineering

Design Of A Robotic Cownose Ray, Mark Marzotto Jun 2018

Design Of A Robotic Cownose Ray, Mark Marzotto

Honors Theses

Nature often inspires advances in science and technology and a promising example of this is mimicking locomotion of underwater animals. The main ways in which manmade aquatic vehicles propel themselves are water jets and propellers, which are inconsistent with how underwater animals swim. The cownose ray displays very efficient thrust with low frequency strokes by using a combination of oscillations and undulations with its pectoral fins. The goal of this paper is to mechanically replicate the actual fin motion of the cownose ray in order to capture these attractive features. The design will account for both the oscillations by designing …


The Design Of An Optimized Patient-Specific In Vivo Spinal Fusion Cage Using Additive Manufacturing, Gorman Donnelly Jun 2015

The Design Of An Optimized Patient-Specific In Vivo Spinal Fusion Cage Using Additive Manufacturing, Gorman Donnelly

Honors Theses

This project involved the design of an all-in-one patient-specific lumbar spinal fusion cage using Direct Metal Laser Sintering (DMLS) manufacturing. The cage is zero-profile and does not need the use of supplemental fixation. It was manufactured out of the titanium alloy Ti 6Al-4V using a DMLS rapid prototyping machine from a third party company. The endplates of the cage are patient-specific allowing for a larger surface contact area between the cage and the vertebral bodies than most cages on the market. This fosters a more successful fusion as well as decreases surgery time, effectively decreasing recovery time. Different porosity variations …


The Optimization Of Porosity And Pore Patterning For Patient-Specific Ti-6 Al-4v Femur Implants, Stephen Paolicelli Jun 2014

The Optimization Of Porosity And Pore Patterning For Patient-Specific Ti-6 Al-4v Femur Implants, Stephen Paolicelli

Honors Theses

Metastatic bone cancer often arises in the long bones of the body. Taking a patient specific approach by utilizing a customized implant is a superior method of treatment compared to today’s solutions, which often includes amputation. A titanium-alloy femur implant has been optimized by varying pore size, pore pattern, and porosity in order to maximize osseointegration. By maximizing osseointegration, the implant will remain firmly in place for a longer period of time because bone will grow throughout the implant, securing it. In addition, it is important for the bone to behave mechanically like bone. This requires the global elastic modulus …


Design Of A Gas Conditioning System For The Second Generation Union College Areogel Lab Catalytic Test Bed, Thomas Swanton Jun 2013

Design Of A Gas Conditioning System For The Second Generation Union College Areogel Lab Catalytic Test Bed, Thomas Swanton

Honors Theses

The goal of this project was to design and fabricate a system which could deliver artificially created test gas to the heating section at a specified composition, flow rate, and humidity, while additionally simulating the transient conditions found in automobile exhaust. It will make up one subsystem of the Union College Aerogel Lab’s second generation catalytic test bed. The test bed will be used to test the viability of catalytic aerogels as three way catalysts for automotive exhaust. To date a system for mixing test based on partial pressure has been fabricated and is operational, a system for generating transient …


The Design Of A Maneuverable Rolling Robot, David Carabis Jun 2013

The Design Of A Maneuverable Rolling Robot, David Carabis

Honors Theses

The purpose of this project was to design, fabricate, and test a maneuverable rolling robot. Although some other rolling robots were researched for this project, a novel approach was taken to design a unique, cheap robot that could turn and was fully enclosed by a rotating outer shell. The design and research phase of this project included the evaluation of several designs, the development of a mathematical model detailing forward motion of the robot, and the derivation of several design equations. Of the possible designs, an interior counterweight was chosen to provide a torque to the outside shell and move …


Design And Testing Of An Automated Semiâ]Trailer Control System, Conor H. Dodd Jun 2011

Design And Testing Of An Automated Semiâ]Trailer Control System, Conor H. Dodd

Honors Theses

Growing up in Maine, the trucking industry is an ever-present part of life. With a very sparse, lightly used rail system, almost all of the raw materials and goods that enter and leave the state do so by truck. Truckers in Maine are constantly challenged by Maine’s roads, which can often be difficult or even treacherous to navigate. The rough logging roads near Jackman or Millinocket, or the sharp ninety degree turns near the Portland oil docks, can ruin a trucker’s day, or even worse, cause an accident. For example, there is a tiny four-way intersection on Broadway in South …


Design And Fabrication Of An Autonomous Solar Powered Airship, Mitchell Van Lee Jun 2011

Design And Fabrication Of An Autonomous Solar Powered Airship, Mitchell Van Lee

Honors Theses

The purpose of the project was to design and build a prototype small scale photovoltaic (PV) powered autonomous airship. The principle reason for the construction of the unmanned airship was to investigate the possibility of using self-guided, lighter-than-air aircraft as an alternative to earth observational satellites for the purposes of terrain mapping and imaging. The necessary electrical energy was produced by single crystal photovoltaic solar cells. The airship was designed to carry an onboard battery in order to provide power generation in the case of intermittent cloud coverage. It was also designed to interface with an Arduino prototyping board which …