Engineering Commons^™

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.

Locking Solar Tracking Bushing, Benjamin James Reed, Andrew Donald Maas, Angel Navarro-Iniguez, John Vincent Bruner

Mechanical Engineering

The contents of this final design review (FDR) outline the progress made by a team of four mechanical engineering students at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo to solve the problem of torsional galloping in solar tracker panels since the preliminary design review. The project proposed by the sponsor, Christian Friedrich, on behalf of ARaymond is a design for a friction based braking system integrated into a redesigned bushing.

The CDR contains details about the system design, the design justification, the manufacturing plan, and design verification plan. In the system design section, the four manufacturing subsystems (bushing mount, actuation, …

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 …

Baby Soothing Device, Grace Kalene Mekrut, Matteo Gozzini, Miles Angel Ibarra, Christian Joel Roberts

Mechanical Engineering

This document is the official final design review for the Baby Soothing Device. This product is intended to help families sleep throughout the night by allowing a baby to be soothed back to sleep without constant and direct parental interaction. It is maintained by Mechanical Engineering students at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo for Dustin Yoder, the project sponsor. The purpose of this document is to present the design process from ideation to finished design in great enough detail that its manufacturing procedure may be replicated if desired. This document further explains all the research, testing, and benchmarks …

Technological Integration To Enhance Jobsite Safety, Luke Barragan

Construction Management

The content derived in this paper portrays the effect that technology has on safety and how it may be enhanced and altered in the built environment. Ensuring safety on the jobsite is the most important aspect of concluding a successful project. Alongside safety on the jobsite is technology, both of which work coherently together to ensure proper construction. Technology has advanced tremendously in the built environment and it is difficult for all aspects of the project to be up to date universally. Safety lacks the technological integration that is found in the design and preconstruction phases of a project. There …

Novelty Ice Cream Assembly Prototype, Mason Sylvester, Logan Williamson, Alvaro Martinez, Adin Gilman-Cohen

Mechanical Engineering

Cool Beans USA is a novelty ice cream startup company founded by Keith Zachow. In the winter of 2022, our team began working with Mr. Zachow to develop a machine to automate parts of the production process for his product. This product consists of two hemispherical ice-cream cone shell halves filled with soft serve ice cream and pressed together. The assembled pods are around the size and shape of a small walnut and are intended to be sold in stores as a frozen finger food. At the time of project inception, this product was in its early stages and was …

Callaway Measurement Device, Andre S. Fisher, Roman Hays, Blake Sousa, Grant Gabrielson

Mechanical Engineering

The purpose of this document is to illustrate the Callaway Measurement Device senior project from start to finish. The challenge given to the team was to update and improve a gauge used by Callaway employees to measure the loft, lie, and face angle of their full spectrum of golf clubs. Once the team understood how the pre-existing gauge operates, the team conducted background research into other technologies that could improve the gauge. The team decided to digitalize the device amongst other tweaks to reduce error. Because the CAD files were not available for the pre-existing device, the team began reverse …

Rotating Backing Brush, Caleb Savard, David Dalal, Max Allred, Mathis Weyrich

Mechanical Engineering

In the final steps of GAF’s shingle production process, small asphalt particles called fines are applied. Some fines adhere well to the shingle sheet, while others temporarily stick only to fall off the sheet further down the manufacturing line. As a result, the shingle plant floor is covered in fines that have fallen due to vibrations and gravity. The technicians and engineers at GAF want a cleaner working environment and to potentially reuse the loose fines. We are a senior project team that solved this problem by designing a system to remove and collect loose fines. In this document, the …

Gasifier Wall Wash Manifold, Ashley Sieu Che, Gintaras Julius Baipsys, Peyton Joseph Archibald, Michael Thomas Kieran

Mechanical Engineering

The objective of our Gasifier Wall Wash Manifold Project is to design three different manifolds that will uniformly distribute water on the inner diameter of a pressure vessel. Also, the distributed water should completely cover the circumference of the inner walls. From extensive research of current solutions as well as the conduction of technical analyses, we were able to produce three designs that would be able to meet our engineering specifications. Time constraints led to the fabrication of one manifold design along with a test rig. With a fully functional test rig, we saw positive results from our design verification …

Sam's Story, Anna Michelle Reid, Jennifer Vazquez

Computer Science and Software Engineering

We are exploring presenting mental health topics in video games through the eyes of an axolotl named Sam. Sam goes about his day to day life facing many difficult challenges regarding their mental health. This is an educational game to inform about different mental health symptoms and what they may look like.

Diy Cell Incubator, Hayden James Jeanor

Electrical Engineering

The purpose of creating a cell Incubator is for the development of cell and tissue production in laboratory settings. Large scale research projects and the medical community grow cells for various reasons, including experiments and creating tissue for patients. However, they cannot simply depend on growing cells in a petri dish that sit on a rack at room temperature. To grow heathy cells in the fastest way possible, they use cell incubators. Cell incubators create an atmosphere within the incubation bay that is designed to promote cell growth. The three main components that need to be constantly regulated, using a …

Tree Climbing Limb Saw, Andrew E. Bray, Parker Tenney, Drew M. Robles, Aimee T. Chiem

Mechanical Engineering

This document is the comprehensive report for the Tree Climbing Limb Saw Senior Project. The purpose of the Tree Climbing Limb Saw project, completed by mechanical engineers Andrew Bray, Aimee Chiem, Drew Robles, and Parker Tenney, is to remove low-hanging branches (<15 >ft) to prevent forest fires from travelling up into the canopy, where wind can carry embers for miles. An RC car was heavily modified to create a solution for this problem. A chainsaw was also mounted to deal with the cutting part of the problem. Creating a project which aims to solve this problem is a great step …

Building Structures From Mycelium, Noah M. Brown

Physics

The purpose of this project was to develop a method for creating bricks from mycelium and agricultural waste. The bulk of the research happened in two parts, the first part being a period in which different substrates, strains, and methods were used build the bricks. This research took place in San Luis Obispo and was aided by a group of students in PSC392 under Dr. Pete Schwartz in early 2022. After developing a method for constructing these bricks, the research was moved to St. Thomas, Jamaica, in collaboration with an ecovillage called The Source Farm from July to September. The …

Investigation Of Temperature, Solution Strength, And Applied Stress Effects On Cation Exchange Processes In Geosynthetic Clay Liners, Kurt Katzenberger

Master's Theses

A laboratory test program was conducted to investigate the effects of temperature, solution strength, and applied stress over increasing conditioning durations on cation exchange processes in sodium bentonite (Na-B) geosynthetic clay liners (GCLs). The test program was intended to determine if the variables of temperature, solution strength, and applied stress had beneficial or detrimental effects on the engineering behavior of Na-B GCLs in municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills and laboratory testing applications. Needlepunched-reinforced, double non-woven Na-B GCL specimens were conditioned in fluids of increasing ionic strength (DI water, 2 mM CaCl2, 50 mM CaCl2, and 200 mM CaCl2 representing control, …

Biodegradation Of Methyl Tert-Butyl Ether And Tert-Butyl Alcohol Using Bioaugmentation With Biowish® Aqua, Elizabeth Villanueva

Master's Theses

Aqua, a commercial product manufactured by BiOWiSH® Technologies, was utilized in this research to study its effectiveness to biodegrade methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE) and tert-butyl alcohol (TBA). Microcosms containing varying concentrations of MTBE and TBA as well as a growth media and mineral salt solution were examined. Analytical instrumentation used in this study included the use of a gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer (GC/MS) to determine concentrations of MTBE and TBA and a spectrophotometer to extrapolate approximate active biomass concentrations in each experiment. Four different environmental conditions were tested for both MTBE and TBA. The environmental conditions tested for each contaminant included: …

Smartphone Detector, Ryan Coldiron

Electrical Engineering

There is a wide variety of times when it is unacceptable to be using a smartphone, and this device could help to minimize when people are using their devices. People have become more and more reliant on their various pieces of technology such as their smartphones, and are often using them when they should be paying attention in class, attending an important meeting, watching a movie, or should just be present to their other surroundings. A device that could detect the use of smartphones at these inopportune times would be something that would benefit a wide variety of people.

The …

Schematic Design And Peer Review Of Gayaza Medical Center And Walk-In Clinic, Abigail Coffing, Alexis Buhr

Architectural Engineering

This report outlines the structural portion of the work done for the Gayaza Medical Center in Kampala, Uganda. This project was funded by HIINGA, an impact fund doing work in Eastern Africa, who tasked an interdisciplinary group of Cal Poly students with developing a preliminary design for the the medical center. The team consisted of Annebel van der Meulen (architecture), Abigail Coffing and Alexis Buhr (structural), and Arley Landis and Brett Shank (construction management). After completing the initial design, the structural team at Cal Poly rejoined the project the following quarter to do a peer analysis of the finalized structural …

Use Of Precious Plastic Method Of Bricks For The Construction Of Tiny Homes, Haylie E. Tallon

Architectural Engineering

Precious Plastics, a Netherlands based company, created an open source project that can be used to create different objects from recycled plastics. The San Luis Obispo area has a large amount of recyclable plastic that is being treated as trash, adding to the pollution of the ocean and the air. This project is to determine the necessary steps to create plastic building blocks, using the Precious Plastic process, as a construction material for low-income, temporary housing. This report covers the process that was used to build two of the machines that will be used to create the bricks. This requires …

Battery Energy Storage System, Carlos Gonzalez, Philip Tafoya, Mariely Caraballo, William Hoang

Electrical Engineering

The Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) project consists of bringing an existing photovoltaic battery energy storage system into service within Cal Poly’s Energy Conversion Lab. Information regarding the BESS is limited to the existing manuals as the original equipment manufacturer has ceased supporting the product in the United States. Results from previous projects on the BESS speculated that a DC input may be required to enable the system’s to be fully operational. The goal of the project is to provide a DC input into BESS and test the system’s functionality. Initially, a Photovoltaic Thevenin Equivalent was expected to be utilized …

Pull Planning Workshop - Central California Valley, Thomas A. Camargo

Construction Management

Lean scheduling and pull planning are both excellent methods of scheduling and sequencing a project. It has made huge impacts on scheduling for general contractors in southern and northern region of California. However, Central California has not been able to see the benefits and impacts of these scheduling tools because of the regions lack of use of lean scheduling and pull planning. Lean scheduling is a technique that encourages communication and collaboration between the project stakeholders. Pull planning offers project stakeholders a chance to rally together and collaborate. These pull planning sessions are useful for sequencing work to meet milestones …

Use Of Gps And Smartgrade Technology In Heavy Civil Construction, Cristian Zarate-Ramirez

Construction Management

Heavy Civil is a sector in the construction industry involving a variety of different heavy machinery and construction practices. Technology has evolved as an important aspect in this sector striving to improve efficiency, productivity, and traditional construction methods. Global Positioning System (GPS) technology is one of the many technological advancements that benefit any size of contractor in the heavy civil industry. With the help of a 3D model, base station, and rover, contractors implement advanced building methods that provide excellent owner satisfaction. Similar to GPS, SmartGrade is a tool integrated into heavy machinery that enhances performance without the need of …

Hiinga Hospital Project - Uganda, Africa, Arley W. Landis

Construction Management

This paper outlines the role of a construction management student in the interdisciplinary development of an urgent care clinic and hospital in Kampala, Uganda. This interdisciplinary team was composed of five students all belonging to the College of Architecture and Environmental Design at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo. The team was tasked by Hiinga Inc., a capital investment company, to provide a preliminary design and construction resources to aid with development of these facilities. Two construction management students worked on this project at different stages. The first student was tasked with constructability research and a preliminary estimate …

Bilingual Advantages To The Construction Industry, Miguel A. Duran Jr.

Construction Management

The purpose of this paper is to analyze and emphasize the importance of the Spanish language within the construction industry to construction management students at Cal Poly. Knowledge within another language is also used at an advantage in the industry as it increases one’s value through this key skill, and aids effective team communication on a project. Furthermore, the construction industry is filled with subcontractor’s majority being of Latin-based descent. Though this key skill is not required by companies, this skill can help verbal communication barriers which occur on a project when most subcontractors only speak the Spanish language. Verbal …

Determining The Interest For A Drone Certification Course, Joel Alberto Ventura

Construction Management

The purpose of this study is to explore the interest of the Construction Management students at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo with drone usage and acquiring a drone license. This research paper analyzes students' prior skill sets that were gained from a past internship or class and if that exposure to drones is sufficient enough to apply those skills to the construction industry. Implementing a drone certification course will benefit both the students and companies in the construction industry. Within the construction industry there is a rise in popularity with using technology devices to track and collect data, …

Site Development Feasibility Study, Andy A. Tenekjian

Construction Management

A feasibility study in the world of construction is deemed as a preliminary due diligence process in which key components of a project are addressed to determine if the project is viable or not. These components are related to time and money, and the end goal of a feasibility study is to determine if the initial investment of time and money is worth the amount of future financial return. What deems a project successful in the preliminary stage is up for interpretation. Each developer and investor have their own return on investment threshold in a multi-family project like the one …

Reality Capture Course Content: Exposing The Next Generation Of Builders To Technology Moving The Industry Forward, Maxwell S. Eisner

Construction Management

This paper discusses the development and execution of lecture and laboratory educational content regarding reality capture technology and workflows. These educational modules were created to cover different use cases for reality capture technology that are currently being used in the construction industry. They also show how reality capture plays a role in the larger virtual design in construction (BIM) process. Importantly, these labs were designed to be completed with the LiDAR scanner on a typical iPhone, which has lowered the barrier to entry for reality capture education and use in industry. While the initial teaching of these courses was done …

Project Management And Systems Engineering Framework For Educational Cubesat Missions, Bailey Garrett

Master's Theses

The rising complexity of CubeSat missions and the unique challenges faced by educational CubeSat programs lead to high rates of mission failure. Implementing project management and systems engineering practices can alleviate these challenges and improve mission success rates for educational CubeSat developers. However, existing project management and systems engineering resources are too cumbersome and often assume the student has a base-level understanding of project management and systems engineering fundamentals. A new universal project management and systems engineering framework was created and tailored specifically to the needs of an educational CubeSat mission. The framework was designed to accommodate first-time CubeSat developers, …

A Design Of A Digital Lockout Tagout System With Machine Learning, Brandon H. Chen

Master's Theses

Lockout Tagout (LOTO) is a safety procedure instated by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) when doing maintenance on dangerous machinery and hazardous power sources. In this procedure, authorized workers shut off the machinery and use physical locks and tags to prevent operation during maintenance. LOTO has been the industry standard for 32 years since it was instantiated, being used in many different industries such as industrial work, mining, and agriculture. However, LOTO is not without its issues. The LOTO procedure requires employees to be trained and is prone to human error. As well, there is a clash between …

Design Of A System To Investigate The Relationship Between Feedback And Delivery Medium For A Novel Motor Task, Ashley Humpal

Master's Theses

Stroke is a chronic, lifelong illness, and full recovery requires continuous physical and cognitive rehabilitation. Such long-term rehabilitation is cost-prohibitive; however an approach to providing long-term therapy that has recently gained traction is the use of socially assistive agent (SAA) systems. These systems make use of non-contact communication devices and can be used to guide people through a variety of rehabilitative tasks. They have the potential supplement current rehabilitation practices by providing motivation during intense exercises, and can extend the reach of the therapist into remote and home settings.

Though SAA systems have been used in a variety of rehabilitative …

Identifying And Minimizing Underspecification In Breast Cancer Subtyping, Jonathan Cheuk-Kiu Tang

Master's Theses

In the realm of biomedical technology, both accuracy and consistency are crucial to the development and deployment of these tools. While accuracy is easy to measure, consistency metrics are not so simple to measure, especially in the scope of biomedicine where prediction consistency can be difficult to achieve. Typically, biomedical datasets contain a significantly larger amount of features compared to the amount of samples, which goes against ordinary data mining practices. As a result, predictive models may fail to find valid pathways for prediction during training on such datasets. This concept is known as underspecification.

Underspecification has been more accepted …