Engineering Commons^™

Investigation Of Surface Topology Effects On Metal Flow Of Aluminum And Steel During Hot Compression, Andrew Richard Matcha

Master's Theses (2009 -)

An investigation was conducted to study the effect of die surface roughness and lay on metal flow and the friction factor under lubricated hot compression. 6061-T6 aluminum and AISI 1018 steel rings and rectangular bar stock workpieces were compressed on H-13 tool steel platens of varying roughnesses ranging from Ra 0.25 – 6.1 µm (10 – 240 µin). Each platen was machined in such a way to ensure that the surface roughness would be unidirectional. Platen temperatures of 149 °C and 204 °C (300 °F and 400 °F) were used for all aluminum ring samples whereas platen temperatures ranging from …

Carbon Fiber Recycler : Fiber Reclaimer, Alexander Edwards

All Undergraduate Projects

Boeing uses composite components for the 777x aircraft. The production of composite parts results in flashing (excess material) that must be trimmed and "thrown away" as scrap. Boeing is investigating means of recycling these scraps. The method proposed for this project is to delaminate and shred the composite material. The delamination process uses a ram to press two claw shaped devices together that bends and deforms the material in opposite directions. The chipper process uses counter rotating saw blades spaced 1/8” apart to produce small shredded material. This shredding material is pyrolyzed (heated) to decay the resin leaving the carbon …

Easy Adjustable Protective Helmet, Ryan Balash

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

Akron Children’s Hospital and The University of Akron’s Biomedical Engineering Design Team Engineering Forward have paired together to improve medical adapted helmets for post-operative and disabled patients. An issue is the helmets are only produced in a couple of sizes. Also, it is a tedious process to constantly adjust the pressure on the patient’s cranium within a trial-and-error process. Engineering Forward plans to improve the effectiveness of this helmet by creating an adjustable helmet that can read the pressure on a patient’s head. The caregiver can then make the necessary adjustments to the helmet to accommodate the patient. Documents of …

Chrome Extension To Explore Modular Homepage, Griffin T. Cloonan, Landon E. Woollard, Nick A. Ponce

Computer Science and Software Engineering

This was an exploratory project, intended to develop skills developing extension based web applications. We spent our time building a modular, customizable homepage extension for google chrome. The bulk of our work was focused towards structure and function, as a result, the project is not highly appealing visually. We worked with foreign concepts in a foreign environment in an attempt to learn new skills on the fly.

A Comparison Of Traditional Education And Project-Based Education In Construction Management, Trey Miller

Honors College Theses

Construction is a rapidly moving and constantly changing industry. The skills needed to manage the complex task of running a job site safely, on schedule, and within budget, are unique to the field. Construction Management as an academic field is relatively new discipline. Therefore the field is still rapidly evolving. In many cases, classes are taught by engineering professors, which leads to an engineering-focused education as opposed to a Project Management focused education. Therefore Construction Management students are not receiving the “hands-on” experience early enough in their studies. By structuring classes around an applied project, students will attain a more …

Software Updates To A Multiple Autonomous Quadcopter Search System (Maqss), Jared Speck, Toby Chan

Computer Engineering

A series of performance-based and feature implementation software updates to an existing multiple vehicle autonomous target search system is outlined in this paper. The search system, MAQSS, is designed to address a computational power constraint found on modern autonomous aerial platforms by separating real-time and computationally expensive tasks through delegation to multiple multirotor vehicles. A Ground Control Station (GCS) is also described as part of the MAQSS system to perform the delegation and provide a low workload user interface. Ultimately, the changes to MAQSS noted in this paper helped to improve the performance of the autonomous search mission, the accuracy …

Implementing Software Lab At Hackathons, Istvan Gates

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

Hackathons are events where groups of college students have 24 hours to build up a any project, using Computer Science and Electrical Engineering skillsets. These events are typically hosted on college campuses, and attract over 200 students per event. Each student brings 2 devices - their phone, and their laptop. That means that 400 devices are connected to a University venue's Internet network, commonly overloading it. Software Lab alleviates this overloading by providing an abstracted NAS node network for events. Software Lab guarantees speeds of at least 100 mbits/s, and provides a 8-10x improvement on download speeds over the common …

Novel Mechanisms Underlying Warm-Up And Percussion Myotonia In Myotonia Congenita, Kevin Richard Nnovak

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Patients with myotonia congenita have muscle hyperexcitability due to loss-of-function mutations in the ClC-1 chloride channel in skeletal muscle, which causes spontaneous firing of muscle action potentials (myotonia), producing muscle stiffness. Triggers for myotonia can occur voluntarily at the neuromuscular junction or involuntarily by striking the muscle with a reflex hammer (percussion myotonia). In patients, muscle stiffness lessens with exercise, a change known as the warm-up phenomenon. Our goal was to identify the mechanism underlying warm-up and percussion myotonia and to use this information to guide development of novel therapies. To determine these underlying mechanisms, we used a drug to …

Robostock: Autonomous Inventory Tracking, Drew Christian Balthazor

Computer Engineering

No abstract provided.

Red Piston (Roborodentia), Gabriel Lee Hernandez, Davie Sy

Computer Science and Software Engineering

Roborodentia is an annual robotics competition held during Cal Poly’s Open House showcase. Teams of one to three people come together to build an autonomous robot to typically collect rings for points. The specifications of the competition will be detailed in the problem statement. For Roborodentia 2016, we built a machine dubbed Red Piston to tackle on this year’s competition. The following report will detail the design process and implementation of our robot.

Slaps Music Sharing App, Maximillian L. Parelius

Computer Engineering

Slaps is a fun way to share new songs with friends. Users can simply select songs from their personal library of music, select a short sample of the song to share, and then select which friends to share it with. If a user loves a song that he/she receives, they can link directly to iTunes through the app to download the full song.

Panorama: Multi-Path Ssl Authentication Using Peer Network Perspectives, William P. Harris

Computer Engineering

SSL currently uses certificates signed by Certificate Authorities (CAs) to authenticate connections. e.g. Google will pay a CA to sign a certificate for them, so that they can prove that they're not someone pretending to be Google. Unfortunately, this system has had multiple problems, and many believe that an alternative needs to be found.

One of the ideas for alternatives is using multiple "network perspectives" to authenticate a server. The idea behind this is that, though playing man-in-the-middle (MITM) with one connection is easy, it should be difficult for an adversary to do so with many connections, especially if they …

Water System For Developing Countries / Disaster Relief Made With Local Materials, Shumon Hasan

Chemistry & Biochemistry Undergraduate Honors Theses

The objective of this project was to design a water purification system that can be constructed from easily available materials, common to the particular country, and is capable of the complete water purification process.

Growing Grounds Inventory Senior Project Application, Javier Balandran

Computer Engineering

No abstract provided.

The Astral Box, Patrick C. Davis, Marshall J. Underwood, Zack R. Hicks, Jahan Z. Hussaini

Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects

No abstract provided.

Nitric Oxide Releasing Polymers For Vascular Graft Applications, Ifeanyi U. Onyejekwe

Biomedical and Chemical Engineering - Dissertations

Nitric oxide [NO] is an endogenous gas involved in a multitude of physiological functions, ranging from vasodilatation, inflammatory response to inhibition of platelet aggregation. Significant interest exists for therapeutic application of exogenous NO, particularly for the improvement of foreign-body responses of biomaterials. One challenge amongst several others that must be taken into consideration is NO's short half-life, ranging from 2-3 s, in physiological systems. Researchers have worked on synthesizing materials, formally referred to as NO donors/NONOates capable of preserving NO and spontaneous gas release upon contact with blood under physiological conditions. Two groups of these commercially available NO donors known …

Active Flow Control Of Low Pressure Turbine Blade Separation Using Plasma Actuators, Karthik Ramakumar

University of Kentucky Master's Theses

The current study examines plasma actuators as flow control devices. The actuators are placed on a turbine blade profile in a 2D turbine cascade for separation flow control. The configuration involves copper strips separated by a layer of dielectric material, across which an AC electric potential in the range of 5 kHz and 5 kV is applied. The efficiency of the actuator is monitored by measuring power input and flow control effectiveness. Preliminary observations are performed for a quiescent case on a flat plate profile to analyze the average and instantaneous velocities generated by the actuator for varied input parameters, …

Modeling Interface Failure In Fiber-Composites, Andrew J. Craig

Honors Capstone Projects - All

Interface failure has been studied in depth for more than the past twenty years due to its significant impact on the application of composite materials. The objective of this work is to investigate the role of the interface in the mechanical response of fiber-matrix composite materials subjected to an applied load. To do this, a single composite cylinder consisting of a rigid core, the fiber, and an elastic annulus, the matrix, with an interface of vanishing thickness separating them, is considered as the first step in what will later be representative of a composite material. Three non-linear, Needleman-type, force-separation relations …

Texture, Microstructure And Formability Of Aluminum Alloys, Xiang-Ming Cheng

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Texture, microstructure and formability were studied in Direct Chill Cast (DC) and Strip Cast (SC) aluminum alloys with regard to crystallographic anisotropy, the Portevin-Le Chatelier effect and aging softening behavior. It was found that material properties change greatly with manufacturing processes (DC vs. SC) and chemical composition (3xxx vs. 5 xxx alloys). DC cast hot band materials are usually fully recrystallized and have strong softening textures while SC hot band materials have a rolling structure with strong deformation textures. Softening textures cause 90 earing while deformation textures result in 45 earing after deep drawing. During cold rolling, 90 earing in …