Engineering Commons^™

Development Of Long Endurance Small Unmanned Aerial System, Andreas Quainoo

Honors Theses

The purpose of this Senior Design Project is to design, build, and test an Unmanned Aerial System (UAS). This will be used as a test platform for airborne electronics. The intended capabilities of this project include a 12-hour flight time, the ability to carry 5 lbs of payload, and the ability to recharge the batteries of electronics while in the air. With these parameters in mind, the focus of the design was on endurance, and, by extension, efficiency and durability. Upon completion, the aircraft and its onboard systems was constructed and evaluated. Secondary products of this project include an instrumented …

Aviation Internship Toolkit: Helping Employers Reach The Next Generation Of Aviation Professionals (Ngap), James Fox

Honors Theses

It has been recognized by the international aviation community that there will be an anticipated shortage of skilled aviation professionals in the near future. In order to address this important issue, International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) launched the Next Generation of Aviation Professionals (NGAP) initiative to ensure that enough qualified and competent aviation professionals are available to operate, manage, and maintain the future international air transport system (ICAO, 2014). This highly complex industry is growing at a significant rate around the globe, and this shortage needs to be addressed before it becomes a threat to this increasing vital and intricate …

Dynamically Reconfigurable Miniature Golf Course, James Lind

Honors Theses

The purpose of this report is to inform the reader of the Senior Design Project lead by 3 students in the Electrical and Computer Engineering department at Western Michigan University. The project is in needed for use within the ECE department as a tool for showcasing to prospective students the attributes of electrical and computer engineering.

At the heart of the project lies an Arduino microcontroller acting as the commanding brain of the system. Its task is to manipulate various types of obstacles throughout the playing field with a goal of delivering a dynamic experience to the player(s). Additionally, a …

Using Greet To Analyze Natural Gas Usage In Municipal Fleets, Bradley E. Gibson

Honors Theses

GREET was used to calculate energy consumption and pollutants emitted from specific fuel/vehicle types when given a specific set of parameters. In this case, the parameters were the type of fuel mix from TVA, the selected vehicle year of 2015, the vehicle weight specified in the heavy-duty vehicle range, and type of simulation technique, which was the Hammersely Sequence Sampling. These inputs, along with seventeen fuel/vehicles mixes, specific pollutants, and cost considerations, were used to investigate the environmental impact of the transition from petrol diesel to natural gas in the municipal fleets of Chattanooga, Tennessee. The energy consumption included coal, …

2014 Sae Aero: Systems Engineering, Adam Herzog

Honors Theses

Union has participated in the annual SAE Aero Competition for the last 6 consecutive years. The aim of the competition involves the design and construction of an RC aircraft capable of carrying a maximum payload weight as consistently as possible. This report will summarize the methods used to determine shape and size of the final aircraft’s control surfaces, as well as include an analysis on the plane’s performance characteristics. The final design utilizes a 100 inch span main wing with a rear taper and an upright H-tail design. In addition, the horizontal tail has a stabilator in place of a …

Analyzing The Leed Certification & Energy Usage Of The Peter Irving Wold Center, Andrea Schwartz

Honors Theses

This report discusses the Leadership in Environmental & Energy Design (LEED) Gold certification of the Peter Irving Wold Center, located in Schenectady N.Y. The credits that the Wold Center achieved in the LEED process are discussed as well as what credits were not achieved. Each credit is described in detail and the feasibility of implementing the credits that were not achieved is considered. The feasibility of achieving Platinum certification is discussed. It is important to note that this analysis, while post-construction, is determining whether or not the building could have achieved Platinum certification during the planning and building process. A …

Computational Model Of Pore Collapse And Densification In Aerogels Under Compression, Lutao Xie

Honors Theses

Aerogels are solid, porous and light materials that are 90-99% air by volume, with particularly small pore sizes and large specific surface areas. According to previous studies, silica aerogels have appeared to be typical fractal materials. Its microstructure can be described as a fractal network in the length scale 10-1000Å, which is considered to be the result of an aggregation mechanism. To model the behavior of this material, a non-linear finite element code was developed to determine the sequence in which elements fail under compressive load for different starting pore distributions. The 2D geometry of the brittle silica lattice was …

Controllable Home Coffee Roaster From A Modified Popcorn Popper, Nicholas Brenn

Honors Theses

The goal of this project is to modify a home popcorn popper with computer aided logging of the roasting profile, supported by solid state switching of the heating coil and fan to control the temperature inside of the roasting chamber, and finally, automatic control of the roasting chamber temperature through a PID algorithm. With this control over the roast of the coffee bean, an experienced roaster user is able to identify the stages of the roast where control over the temperature inside the chamber is most critical. As compared to roasting green beans in an unmodified home popcorn popper, this …

Application Of A High-Performance Optically Enhanced Solar Thermal Collector System, Timothy H. Cameron

Honors Theses

In an effort to make Union College a more environmentally friendly campus, this research project focuses on the application of Union’s liquid-based solar thermal collector system. The motivation for this research project is due to the increasing demand for renewable energy sources in order to decrease our society’s dependence on fossil fuels. The system features nine, 16-tube, evacuated tube solar modules which absorb radiant solar energy from the sun. Through a two loop system, thermal energy is stored in water within two-80 gallon storage tanks. This research project involves the design, construction, and analysis of two applications in order to …

Design And Optimization Of The Steering Braking And Drivetrain For The Asme Human Powered Vehicle, Marjorie Chee

Honors Theses

The Union College Human Powered Vehicle Team has designed, built and tested Chester’s Chariot for the 2014 American Society of Mechanical Engineers Human Powered Vehicle Challenge. The goal of this year’s team was produce an efficient, sustainable, and practical human powered vehicle with a high degree of safety. The team conducted gear ratio analysis, beam bending analysis, aerodynamic analysis using computational and analytical methods. In addition, physical testing was completed to demonstrate the safety and performance of Chester’s Chariot. Chester’s Chariot has the capability of obtaining higher speeds due to an optimized gear set. Last year’s vehicle did not have …

Evolving Soft Robots With Vibration Based Movement, Andrew Danise

Honors Theses

Creating effective designs for soft robots is extremely difficult due to the large number of different possibilities for shape, material properties, and movement mechanisms. Due to the lack of methods to design soft robots, previous research has used evolutionary algorithms to tackle this problem of overwhelming options. A popular technique is to use generative encodings to create designs using evolutionary algorithms because of their modularity and ability to induce large scale coordinated change. The main drawback of generative encodings is that it is difficult to know where along the ontogenic trajectory resides the phenotype with the highest fitness. The two …

Asme Human Powered Vehicle Competition Frame Design, Zacarie Hertel

Honors Theses

Each year, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) sponsors the Human Powered Vehicle Challenge. The purpose of the competition is to provide a continued source of research into human powered vehicles. Generally, the vehicles for this competition consist of faired recumbent tricycles and bicycles, capable of reaching high speeds in an efficient manner. The subject of this report is the design and analysis of a new vehicle frame for Union’s 2014 competition entry. The frame is the structural skeleton of the vehicle, supporting the rider and all vehicle components. The frame is what withstands the majority of the loads …

Looking For Small Changes In Heat Capacity Using A Differential Scanning Calorimeter, Will Linthicum

Honors Theses

One of the major difficulties in development of renewable energy is the lack of an adequate and economical means of energy storage. In the case of concentrated solar power a large mass of thermal fluid is required to store a reasonable amount of energy. This is primarily because the fluids tend to have a low specific heat capacity. Formulating composites of these fluids can enhance their specific heat capacity and avails opportunities to make concentrated solar power more attractive. In most cases, the specific heat capacity of composite materials is a weighted average of the individual component heat capacities. This, …

Effects Of Playing Surface And Shoe Type Of Acl Tears In Soccer Players, Melissa Mansfield

Honors Theses

Anterior Cruciate Ligament injuries have become more common in athletes over the past decade which is believed to result from playing on more artificial turf surfaces. This study tested the playing surface theory by building upon a previous study conducted with Albany Medical Center which tested surface samples using an axial-torsion load frame located at Union College. The motion that causes most ACL noncontact injuries is replicated by the load frame which pushes and rotates a shoe against the playing surface and measures the torque it experiences. The foot position, normal load, degree of rotation and rate of rotation were …

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 …

Fixed Platform Crane For Equipment Access, Carlos Gonzalez, Steven Hollander, Yue Zhao, Jared Pellegrin, Travis Odom

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Outlining The Biocidal Mechanisms Of Synthetic Antimicrobial Peptide Mimics, Tyler D. Brown

Honors Theses

Each day, antibiotic resistance affects the livelihood of individuals worldwide, especially in relation to hospital-acquired diseases. In an effort to combat this resistance, antimicrobial peptides, small biopolymers produced naturally by multicellular organisms, can be used to selectively eliminate bacteria and have demonstrated great potential as alternatives to conventional antibiotics. Many naturally-occurring antimicrobial peptides possess high concentrations of lysine and arginine amino acid residues, which are protonated and positively-charged at physiological pH. Herein, we describe the design and synthesis of antimicrobial peptide mimics, using amino acid mimics. N-3-aminopropyl methacrylamide (APMA) and 3-guanidinopropyl methacrylamide (GPMA) monomers mimic the amino acid residues lysine …

Characterization Of Mc252 Subtidal And Intertidal Oil Mats On A Coastal Headland Beach, Allyson C. Lutz

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Mobile Marksman Iv, Nicolas Moreau

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Experimental Investigation Of Injectivity In Unconsolidated Formations, Callie Pritchett

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

In Vivo Evaluation Of An Automated Pressure Sore Reducer, Linda J. Cross

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Design Of Low Power Alternative Energy Systems With Applications To Experimental Education, Xingjian ‘Harry’ Gao

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

The Effect Of Co-Solvent And Ordered Lattice Structure On Catalysis Of Biodiesel Production In Microreactors, Benjamin J. D. Kegley

Honors Theses

In this study, stable single phase feedstocks for biodiesel production were successfully determined. The addition of free fatty acids, which are considered waste, to the soy bean oil and methanol processing feed as a co-solvent, produces a stable single phase. The single phase feedstock significantly increases initial global rates and supplements the oil with further biodiesel production. A stable single phase feedstock and increased reaction rates are desirable due to the use of continuous heterogeneous biodiesel production in microreactors currently being developed by this research group. Further design improvements to the microreactor design have been determined. Such improvements include the …

Reduction Of Ketoximes To Amines By Catalytic Transfer Hydrogenation Using Raney Nickel And 2-Propanol As Hydrogen Donor, Katherynne E. Taylor

Honors Theses

Ketoximes successfully underwent hydrogenolysis and hydrogenation under catalytic transfer conditions with Raney Nickel and 2-propanol as a hydrogen donor. Ketoximes were reduced to primary amines when 2% KOH was included in the reaction. In the absence of KOH N-isopropyl-secondary-amines were obtained in good yields.

Cryoprotectant Loading In A Microchannel, Shelby Pursley

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Computational Modeling Of Drug Release From Bone Scaffolds, Corey Landry

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Development Of Biomechanical Analysis Techniques For Fatigue Of Transtibial Prosthetic Socket And Pylon Interactions, Thomas Z. Sudbury

Honors Theses

The lack of formal, engineering based information is prevalent in the prosthetic industry. Currently, very few prosthetic manufacturing companies can definitively tell their patients how long their products will last. Because of this lack of information, many amputee patients will experience failure of their transtibial prosthetic device during daily activities. One such failure occurs from the fatigue of everyday use. Fatigue failures originate from the repeated application of certain loading conditions. These repeated loads usually occur for millions of cycles before a transtibial prosthetic catastrophically fails. The purpose of this study is to develop a testing procedure and apparatus that …

Application Of Concurrent Engineering Design, Chance Ballard

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Subtalar Fusion Fixture Design And Test, Andrew Campbell

Honors Theses

An experiment was designed to quantify the relative displacement between the calcaneus and talus ankle bones during various types of loading. The ankles were embedded in an epoxy resin and three loads were applied: compressive forces, flexion moments, and inversion moments. A stereo camera system took photographs during the loading process, and the images were correlated via digital image correlation (DIC). The DIe was carried out via a suite of homemade programs written using the open-sourced computational program Octave.

Subtalar Fusion Fixture Design And Test, Nathan Ortiz

Honors Theses

Subtalar arthrodesis is performed when cartilage in the talo-calcaneal (the ankle) joint is degraded in a patient and there are multiple approaches to this surgery. Using synthetic bone material, fixtures were cast from aluminum, using the process of evaporation pattern casting, and epoxy. This casting was used to grip the calcaneus bone of the foot in order to load it mechanically, simulating different scenarios that would be encountered during walking. The relative displacement of the ankle joint was measured using a digital image correlation (DIC) program that was modified to work in both two- and three-dimensional space. This program can …