Engineering Commons^™

A Comparison Of Western And Eastern Soft Systems Approaches, John L. Anaya, John L. Anaya, John L. Anaya

Master's Theses

Soft System Approaches have been developed worldwide to help problem-solvers and decision-makers develop solutions to complex problems, such as aerospace systems. Soft System Approaches were designed to help lower the disorder of developing a complex system by increasing understanding of a situation. Four Soft System Approaches were investigated, two from the West and two from the East. Within the context of the paper, the West refers to thought patterns associated with thinkers and scientists in Europe and North America, and the East refers to those from and around China. The two from the West are Peter Checkland’s Soft Systems Methodology …

Design Fire Robert E. Kennedy Library, California Polytechnic State, San Luis Obispo, Jennifer Ocampo

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

This report evaluates the fire protection system of the Kennedy Building using a prescriptive approach and a performance-based design. The prescriptive approach evaluates code compliance of the structural design, fire suppression system, alarm and detection and smoke control. The performance-based design evaluates egress and life safety protection and three design fires that could potentially compromise the goals and objectives of the design.

The Kennedy Building is on the Campus of Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo and serves as the primary library of the university. This building has five stories of mixed occupancies. It is partially sprinklered, has limited automatic detection …

Fire Protection Engineering For Building A, Ai Choong Loh

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

Building A is a 9-storey mixed used development in Singapore to be completed in 2028. Fire safety provisions of Building A shall be in accordance with Singapore Fire Code 2018.

The report has analyzed the fire safety provisions in the area of structural fire protection provision, means of escape provision, automatic water suppression system provision, automatic fire detection and alarm system provision, engineering smoke control system provision, flammability assessment as well as performance based assessment.

Generally, building A complied to the prescriptive requirements of automatic water suppression system provision, automatic fire detection and alarm system, structural fire provision and means …

Practical Podcasting: A Technical Guide To Producing Studio-Quality Podcasts, Jacob Sarmiento

Liberal Arts and Engineering Studies

Podcasting exists at the intersection of the technical aspects of audio engineering and disciplines such as journalism and story-telling. Podcasts at KCPR, the student radio station, cover a wide range of topics including the soundscape of the DIY music scene in San Luis Obispo (SLO) on SLO-Fi, the intricacies of navigating SLO on Cal Poly 101, the best of Cal Poly Athletics on The Gallop, and the voices of underrepresented populations on campus on Different Matters. KCPR utilizes podcasts to entertain and inform its audience of the various experiences possible as a Cal Poly student. As a student-run entity, KCPR …

Graphite: Open Source 2d Graphics Editor, Christopher H. Mendoza, Oliver A. Dolan

Computer Science and Software Engineering

Graphite is an open source 2D graphics editor aiming to provide a useful alternative to the Adobe product suite while integrating modern ideas from research and industry, including a node-based procedural approach that makes the design process fully non-destructive. Tools from the VFX and gamedev industry like Nuke, Houdini, and Substance Designer have proven the power and flexibility of node-based systems, but they are each lacking in their user experience because of the deep level of complexity that is not abstracted into simpler concepts for users (Adobe Systems, SideFX, The Foundry Visionmongers Ltd., n.d.). Graphite puts the node-based core into …

Office Building In Moffett Park District, Cody Williams

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

The objective of this review is to analyze and evaluate the fire safety of a 5-story office building located in the Moffett Park District in Sunnyvale, California. The building is constructed largely of mass timber and classified as a Type IIIA building used primarily as office space. The first section of the report focuses on the building’s defining characteristics and use cases. The second portion of the report presents a comprehensive review of egress design, fire alarm systems, fire suppression systems, structural design, implementation of mass timber elements, and flammability requirements. The results of the analysis show that the building …

Fire Protection Analysis Of A K-12 Classroom Building, Raymond Yip

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

The report evaluates the fire protection features of a K-12 classroom building (Bldg. B) in San Bernardino County, California. Bldg. B is a two-story Type V-A light timber frame construction. At the time of this report’s composition, Bldg. B is undergoing modernization construction. The fire protection analysis of this building consists of prescriptive and performance portions.

The prescriptive analysis verifies the compliance of building egress, passive, and active protection features with the 2019 edition of California Codes of Regulations Title 24 (Title 24) and Title 24-adopted National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) standards. The analysis comprises of four sections: egress, structural …

Food Processing And Campus Market (Building 24), Ian De Vries

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

This report provides a prescriptive and performance-based analysis of the Food Processing Building located on Cal Poly’s campus in San Luis Obispo, California. Food science and nutrition classes take place at the facility where faculty and students manufacture food products such as chocolates, jams, and barbecue sauces. The finished products are offered for sale in the building’s mercantile area, known as the Campus Market, in addition to other retail locations around the city. The Food Processing Building is considered mixed use with portions of the building classified as moderate-hazard factory (F-1), moderate-hazard storage (S-1), business (B), mercantile (M), and assembly …

Fire Protection And Life Safety Analysis Of The Illinois Department Of Transportation (Idot) District Six Headquarters Building, Karl Mallinger

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

Enclosed in this report is a comprehensive analysis of the fire protection and life safety components of the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) District Six Headquarters building. The original building was constructed in 1972 and renovation operations were recently completed in 2022. The building is four stories in height with an aggregate floor area of approximately 69,300 square feet. The building functions as an office space for IDOT staff, therefore the majority of floor space is used as open office and private office space. The business spaces are supported by assembly spaces such as conference and break rooms on each …

University Of Washington Bill & Melinda Gates Center For Computer Science & Engineering, Devin Ide

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

The purpose of this report is to analyze and evaluate the prescriptive and performance-based criteria used to design the fire protection systems installed in the Gates Center for Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington, Seattle Campus. The Gates Center is a five-story building housing business and assembly spaces such as classrooms, workrooms, offices, a lecture hall, event center, and a café. The main architectural feature is a central atrium, which connects the ground, first, second, and third floors of the building.

Aspects of the prescriptive-based fire protection design include egress, automatic sprinkler systems, detection and notification devices, …

Fire And Life Safety Evaluation Of An Assisted Living And Memory Care Center, Sarah Chandonait

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

This culminating project has been submitted as part of the graduate program in Fire Protection Engineering at Cal Poly. It documents an Assisted Living and Memory Care Center’s compliance with applicable fire safety prescriptions contained in the 2019 California Building and Fire Codes (CBC and CFC). Performance-based methods incorporating deterministic design fires were then used to verify that the final building design and operating procedures met the life safety needs of its unique occupants.

The building under analysis was a 45,000 sq. ft, two-story, 58-bed residential care facility for the elderly. Occupants were all 60 years or older without acute …

Analysis Of Scramento State University Union, Zachary Schuler

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

Sacramento State Union is a centrally located building with a large occupant load during the school year. This building is a 239,000-square-foot three-story structure built originally back in 1975. This original building was constructed using waffle slab construction. Additions in 1996 and 2016 were built using steel beam and girder construction to meet the total square footage we have today. This mixed-use occupancy is not only a congregation point, but many events are held in this building as well.

In this analysis of the building, fire life safety systems are reviewed and determined if they not only meet the minimum …

Building San Francisco, Ca, Kevin Nguyen

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

The objective of this report is to conduct a thorough analysis and evaluation of the existing fire life safety and fire protection systems in place at the Building located in San Francisco, California. The building is classified as a Type II-A building and serves predominantly as office space. The building is six stories tall with a total gross area of approximately 97,170 SF.

The initial portion of this report concentrates on a thorough prescriptive-based analysis, which provides an evaluation of the egress design, fire alarm system, communication systems, fire suppression system, structural and construction design, smoke control, and flammability requirements. …

Fire Protection And Life Safety Analysis Of The 2704-Hv Hanford Building, Guillermo Rodriguez

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

This report analyzes multiple aspects of fire protection and life safety design for the 2704-HV Building located at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation Site in Washington State. The analysis contained within focuses on both prescriptive and performance-based designs for the fire systems within the structure. The 2704-HV building is a two-story office building containing approximately 90 individual full-office spaces on each floor along with approximately 60 individual cubicle office spaces on each floor. There are various other types of gathering spaces within the 2704-HV layout including: conference rooms, showers, kitchen and dining areas, training rooms, and lobbies.

The 2704-HV building was …

A Fire Protection And Life Safety Analysis Of An Oupatient Healthcare System Building, Conrad Chandler

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

The subject building of the report is an outpatient healthcare system building that is a two stories in height and 184,670 SF building. This building offers primary, specialty, and mental health outpatient care to patients throughout its state of location.

The facility is a mixed occupancy building with business as the primary occupancy, a surgery suite that classifies as an ambulatory health care occupancy, and assembly uses in the conference rooms, kitchen, and canteen. The Authority Having Jurisdiction (AHJ) has adopted the National Fire Codes (NFC) published by the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), and throughout this report, the life …

The Acme Building Fire Hazards Analysis, Russ Livesay

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

This Fire Hazards Analysis (FHA) was written using modern fire protection engineering principles to characterize the Applied Chemistry Management and Enrichment (ACME) Building at the Pacific Northwest National Research Area (PNNRA) using both a prescriptive-based and performance-based analysis to ensure the building and occupants can be safe in fire conditions. Recommendations are made as part of this analysis to improve the survivability of this structure if a fire were to occur.

This building was found to be compliant with the prescriptive code requirements from the 2018 International Building Code except for a few minor issues that are currently being repaired. …

Fire Life Safety Design Of Technology Office, Jared Ellis

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

The subject building is an approximately 180,000 SF technology office; the location and some details are omitted for privacy of the project and client. It is a 3-story heavy timber frame (Type IIIA) over 1 level of concrete basement stepped into a hillside.

The building is compliant with the prescriptive building code for egress, fire alarm, and fire sprinkler systems. A NFPA 72 compliant fire detection, notification and communication system is provided. The building is fully sprinklered with a system that is hydraulically designed per NFPA 13, 2016 Section 11.2.3 Water Demand Requirements – Hydraulic Calculation Methods. Water supply is …

An Exploration Into The Design Of A Portable Music Player For People With Alzheimer’S And Dementia, Jaxon V. Silva

Liberal Arts and Engineering Studies

An exploration into the design of a portable music player for people with Alzheimer's and dementia.

Novel Hitch Cargo Cart, Cesilio Sanchez Ramirez, Lance Haidet, Richard Lontoc, Tyler Selinka

Mechanical Engineering

This document presents the engineering design process used to develop, manufacture, and test a new and improved iteration of a hitch cart prototype. This process was performed by a team of four mechanical engineering seniors as part of California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo’s senior design pathway. The goal of this project was to develop a sturdy and reliable iteration of our sponsor’s hitch cart prototype, that integrated the functionality of a vehicle hitch cargo platform and that of a height adjustable cargo cart into a single streamlined and easy to use product. This design could be used by …

Grange Insurance Audubon Center-Fire Protection Life Safety Report, Gabriel Levy

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

This technical approach narrative presents the intent and methodology of the Fire Protection and Life Safety systems for the Grange Insurance Audubon Center located at 505 W Whittier St. Columbus OH 43215. The primary goal of the structure is to provide life and property protection in a fire scenario while taking into account the costs of implementing the criterion and risks associated with the facility. This will be achieved through the appropriate application of requirements listed in the 2015 International Building Code (IBC) and the International Fire Code (IFC) as adopted by the City of Columbus, Ohio, and any reference …

Fire Protection And Life Safety Analysis Of The Adult Education Facility, William K.W. Bridges

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

The objective of this report is to provide an analysis of an existing building’s prescriptive-based and performance-based design methods. The intention is to provide the building owner with a working assessment of the building’s current life safety situation, as well as providing recommendations to improve the overall life safety and property protection of the selected building. This report is developed following the writing style and structure to meet the requirement for the Master of Science Degree in Fire Protection Engineering from California Polytechnic State University. The analysis includes an evaluation of the building owner’s fire and safety program for the …

Warren Baker Center For Science And Mathematics- Fire Protection And Life Safety Analysis, Logan Honeycutt

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

This report covers an analysis of the fire protection features within the Warren Baker Center for Science and Mathematics Building. This document first discusses the prescriptive requirements for the building as determined by applicable code. The items to be discussed, as they relate to prescriptive requirements, include the means of egress and relatable components, fire resistive construction, fire alarm system, fire sprinkler system, and smoke control system. All components were analyzed and compared to each applicable code to assess whether these specific fire protection systems were designed correctly.

In addition to an analysis of the prescriptive measures in this facility, …

Mount Sac Gym & Aquatics Center: Fire & Life Safety Report, Alex Hoeft

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

This report has been prepared to review and analyze the Fire and Life Safety status of the proposed Gym & Aquatics building at Mt. San Antonio College. This was done using two methods: prescriptive and performance based. The prescriptive section examines the explicitly code-mandated requirements for the building and the performance-based section examines implicit requirements for the building based on the goals presented in the Life Safety Code, NFPA 101.

The subject building is a 147,000 square foot, two-story, steel-framed athletics complex occupied primarily for assembly and business uses. The structure has an indoor and outdoor component with two gymnasiums …

Cable Transit De-Icing Project, Brooke Marvin, Christian Degrood, James Lavelle, Shanna Plouff

General Engineering

Holmes Solutions has presented two projects that require similar solutions - ice removal from the Switchback and the Whoosh, with the Switchback’s cables currently being the primary focus. The Frost Fighters have been tasked to find a way to stop ice formation on the Switchback’s cables so that the ride can operate safely in cold climates and during the colder months of the year. To be an adequate solution, the chosen de-icing method must operate in temperatures from -10°C to 40°C and be on standby in temperatures from -40°C to 60°C. In addition, it must prevent any falling debris that …

Eagle Medical Tray Denesting & Debris Removal Process, Nicholas Allen Ungefug, Noah Chavez, Susana Shu-Lin Okhuysen, Michael Augustine Pennington

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Eagle Medical Incorporated is a contract medical device packaging and sterilization company. The company purchases thermoformed medical packaging trays, which maintain the sterility of medical devices, from various manufacturers. To ensure packaging quality and to prevent cleanroom contamination, Eagle Medical inspects and sterilizes each blister tray that they order. This process is an essential non-value-added activity that creates a bottleneck. Cleanroom employees must stop packaging medical devices and attend to the processing of blister trays and packaging solutions. The blister trays arrive at Eagle’s facility in nested stacks. Vibration and movement during shipping further compresses the stacks, which makes separation …

Non-Destructive Material Analysis Of Metals And Composites Via Thermography, Jonathan R. Doubt, James L. Chapman

Materials Engineering

The Naval Surface Warfare Center, Port Hueneme Division, is interested in the development of non-destructive damage assessment of shipboard materials via drones at distance. Long Pulsed Thermography (LPT), a method of non-destructive evaluation, was investigated as a possible method for detecting damage in metals (5005h24 Al alloy and 1008 carbon steel) and composites (aramid fiber honeycomb sandwich structure) at distances from 0.5 m to 3.0 m. LPT was conducted using two 1000 W can lights to heat the samples, and a FLIR E8-XT thermal camera. The images were then analyzed using ImageJ software to determine if damage could be detected …

Smartphone Control Of Rc Cars, Weston R. Fitzgerald

Electrical Engineering

The smartphone-controlled RC (remote-controlled) car is an inexpensive remote-controlled car designed to be fast and portable. Instead of manufacturing, packaging, and shipping a separate controller, the remote control is implemented in a phone application, which saves time and money in both the design process and the manufacturing process. Utilizing the user’s smartphone is more cost-effective since mobile devices are a common recurrence, and packaging fewer devices results in overall better portability of the product.

This smartphone-controlled car is speedy and intuitive to learn for typical smartphone users. The user can change the car’s speed and direction wirelessly using their phone; …

Process Support Building Savannah River Site, Victoria Zawacki

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

A report on the fire and life safety analysis of the Savannah River Site Process Support Building is required in order to receive a Master of Science in Fire Protection Engineering from the California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. The Process Support Building is a two-story office building that was first occupied in 2013, with a floor area of approximately 10,000 ft2. The building contains mainly personal offices, but also contains conference and turnover rooms, a Computer Simulation Room, an Observation Room, and a lunch area. The analysis includes both prescriptive and performance-based analysis.

The Process Support Building is …

8 Observatory Road- Fire Protection & Life Safety Analysis, Jeffrey Chiu

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

A fire protection and life safety analysis was performed on the building “8 Observatory Road” located in Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong. This analysis was performed as part of the fulfillment of requirements for Master of Science in Fire Protection Engineering degree from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.

This report covers both a prescriptive and performance-based analysis. This building was designed and constructed in Hong Kong, adhering to the local codes and British Standard. For this report, the building was analyzed to the requirements of the International Building Code (IBC) and National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) Standards. For …

Fire Protection And Life Safety Analysis Of A University Conference Center, Amanda Beck Larkin

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

This project report analyzes various aspects of fire protection and life safety design for a University Conference Center, for both prescriptive and performance-based designs. The University Conference Center is a ten-story, high-rise building comprised of various gathering spaces, ranging from small conference rooms to large assembly spaces with auditorium-style seating. The building has a large two-story podium with basement below, with a smaller floor plate, ten-story tower offset to one side.

In the prescriptive analysis, no deficiencies were noted in the water-based suppression or fire resistance analysis. The building construction type, height, area, number of stories, wall and structural ratings, …