Engineering Commons^™

Design Of An Experimental Approach To Study The Growth Of Biofilm On Polymethylmethacrylate, Eireen S. Escalona

Biomedical Engineering

Biofilms are present in virtually every solid-liquid contact surface and are partially responsible for some diseases and water cleaning. They are a community of a variety of organisms that live symbiotically and are bound together by extracellular polymeric substances, or EPS. Biofilms go through five stages of development. These include initial and irreversible attachments, maturations I and II, and dispersion. In the dental world, biofilms are often associated with mouth infections including dental caries, gingivitis and periodontitis. Elderly denture wearers are susceptible to the pathogen-causing bacteria associated with these diseases, particularly those who have Alzheimer's disease or other forms of …

Finite Element Analysis Of The Nerve Cuff To Determine Usability And Stress Analysis During Regular Use, Vivek Machhi

Biomedical Engineering

To determine the stress analysis on the Nerve Cuff by MicroProbes, a finite element analysis was conducted. A simplified model was created in Solid Works using the geometry of the basic model of the nerve cuff. The solid model was then imported into Abaqus and the appropriate materials, boundary conditions, and loads were designated. Initially a tensile test simulation was conducted using a tensile force of 2.87 Newtons. The maximum stress experienced with this tensile force was 8.225 MPa which was greater than the ultimate tensile strength of 5.5 MPa of Silicone. Both the actual tensile test and the tensile …

Reliability Analysis Of Low-Silver Bga Spheres Comparing Failure Detection Criteria, Briana Fredericks

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

One of the challenges of solder joint reliability tests is estimating the time of failure of the solder joint. Failure criteria should be able to detect solder joint failure as early as possible, while minimizing the probability of false detection. The failure mechanism under study is cracks due to thermal fatigue. The most common method to estimate failure due to cracks is to monitor the resistance during testing, because solder imaging and cross-sectioning methods are destructive. Current industry failure criteria do not adequately demonstrate the relationship between the size of the crack and the resulting change in resistance. This project …

Unique Replogle Flume Installations At The Truckee-Carson Irrigation District, Stuart Styles, Brandon Downing, Walter Winder

BioResource and Agricultural Engineering

The Water Measurement Program (WMP) for Truckee-Carson Irrigation District (TCID) began in 1997, when the Irrigation Training and Research Center (ITRC) of Cal Poly State University was asked to develop a volumetric measurement plan for TCID, funded by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, Mid-Pacific Region. This program was intended to develop and install reasonably accurate turnout delivery measurement techniques in the district. As part of the WMP, TCID was required to install a number of new open-channel measurement devices. TCID opted for the Replogle flume as its primary flow measurement device using the newly developed WinFlume computer program.

A few …

Identifying At-Risk Students: How Use Of Optional Study Materials And Collection Of Graded Work Correlate With Academic Performance, Vladimir I. Prodanov

Electrical Engineering

We report on a study designed to identify students at risk by monitoring certain academic behaviors. Two different approaches were implemented. The first one involves monitoring student access of optional homework problems. While this approach was successful in the early identification of students at-risk, optional homework (as opposed to mandatory one) degrades attainment of learning objectives. The second approach relies upon “counting” of uncollected work. Since no grades were posted, the only way for the students to keep track of their performance was to collect their work. Failure to collect graded work, we argue, is indicative of weak motivation, poor …

Vineyard Drip Irrigation Design, Roman Ferro

BioResource and Agricultural Engineering

The goal of this project is to develop a cost and water efficient drip irrigation system. This irrigation system will deliver irrigation needs to a future 2.5 acre vineyard owned by the Jaqua family. The design accounts for the specifics of the field such as soil type, slope, crop water requirement, etc. A detailed design was created which includes part specifications, cost estimate and field map.

An Experimental Investigation Of The Stol Performance Of Cal Poly's Amelia In The Nfac, Jonathan Andrew Lichtwardt

Master's Theses

Results from Cal Poly's recent wind tunnel test, during the Winter of 2011-2012, in the 40- by 80-foot test section at the National Full-Scale Aerodynamics Complex (NFAC) at NASA Ames Research Center are presented. AMELIA, the Advanced Model for Extreme Lift and Improved Aeroacoustics, is the first full-span, cruise efficient, short take-off and landing (CESTOL) model incorporating leading- and trailing-edge blowing wing circulation control and over-the-wing mounted turbine propulsion simulators (TPS) to date. Testing of the 10 foot span model proved successful and was the result of a 5 year NASA Fundamental Aeronautics Program Research Announcement. The test generated extensive …

Enabling Rapid Conceptual Design Using Geometry-Based Multi-Fidelity Models In Vsp, Joel Brian Belben

Master's Theses

The purpose of this work is to help bridge the gap between aircraft conceptual design and analysis. Much work is needed, but distilling essential characteristics from a design and collecting them in an easily accessible format that is amenable to use by inexpensive analysis tools is a significant contribution to this goal. Toward that end, four types of reduced-fidelity or degenerate geometric representations have been defined and implemented in VSP, a parametric geometry modeler. The four types are degenerate surface, degenerate plate, degenerate stick, and degenerate point, corresponding to three-, two-, one-, and zero- dimensional representations of underlying geometry, respectively. …

Cpe 200: Small Bear Project, David Burke, Devin Tang

Computer Engineering

CPE 200 is an elective course designed for sophomores in the Computer Engineering Department. This project was intended to design the class, such that, students will understand the skills a computer engineer develops and how to apply those skills.

Design Of A Specimen Fixture For Impact Resistance Testing In An Instron Dynatup 8250 Drop Weight Impact Tester, Daniel Alejandro Barath

Aerospace Engineering

The purpose of this report is to outline the path and methods used to design a specimen fixture for the testing and analysis of fiber reinforced composites subjected to impact loading. This design is done in support of the California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo Structures and Composites Laboratory. The design request was made at the request of Dr. Eltahry Elghandour to support the graduate students Kodi A. Rider and Y. Vanessa Wood in their master’s degree thesis projects.

The design request involved the design of a specimen fixture compatible with the existing impact apparatus located in the …

Detachable Point Of Sale Material For Asparagus Shipper, Michael Thomas

Industrial Technology and Packaging

Gourmet Trading Company is a fresh fruit and vegetable distributor specializing in asparagus, blueberries, and blackberries. The company currently mails a 7” by 11” sign to be displayed with their asparagus which arrives in a 28 pound shipper. The signs are intended to be displayed in stores to give consumers information about the asparagus. Unfortunately, many of the signs do not get displayed since they are shipped separately. The purpose of the project is to redesign the 28 pound asparagus shipper to include a detachable point of sale sign.

A literature search was conducted to further understand the needs of …

Application Of Assignment Problem Theory To Cal Poly's Week Of Welcome Program Presentation Schedule, Kevin T. Aban

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

The Week of Welcome (WOW) is a part of Cal Poly’s Orientation Programs. One of the main objectives of WOW is to provide content to new students on a variety of different topics in the form of Awareness Presentations. The problem being addressed in this paper is that of assigning the orientation groups of incoming students to these Awareness Presentations so that they have a schedule that meets all of the necessary criteria. The most important of those requirements is schedule balance and flexibility for future use. This scheduling problem is solved through the use of operations research and binary …

Gyroscope Assembly Process Improvement Analysis, Ian Douglass, Juan Ulises Saucedo

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

The gyro is a fundamental portion of many assemblies that Company S, a directional drilling company, manufactures. The gyro assembly is a highly sensitive and complex process, and it was paramount to establish efficiency and quality guidelines to base management decisions. The first guideline succeeded by increasing throughput by means of a simulation using ProModel. Next, non-value and value added activities were identified through a value stream map. Lastly, a database was developed in order to capture high integrity quality control data, or key performance indicators, such as, throughput, first-pass inspection yields at every test performed, and defects found. This …

Implementation Of A Sustainable Project Management Methodology For Cal Poly Sae Baja, Theo Graziadei

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

A lack of project organization manifested through unclear team goals, rush deliveries of materials, lost tools and materials, half days of effort due to improper planning, wasted design time, missed submission dates, lack of clear job positions at competition, and low competition scores. A process was created to properly manage the team and it was implemented through the use of various templates, examples, and calculation programs. Each deliverable received feedback from this project’s stakeholders and changes were reflected in the final process. The results were as follows:

Table 1: Summary of Results

Implement a sustainable project management methodology

Each step …

The Design, Testing, And Manufacturing Of A Pin Fin Extrusion Heat Sink, Arash Michael Mira

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

My senior project focuses on the design, testing, and manufacturing of pin fin extrusion heat sinks that are you used to cool simple electronic applications across a multitude of markets. Without the modern day heat sink, electronics that we have become familiar with throughout our everyday lives will cease to exist. I will design these heat sinks using Solid Works 3D CAD. I will then test the heat sinks using ICEPAK CFD software, where I will model the heat sink against a 5 watt application, inside of a cabinet that models the chassis of a computer. After receiving these results, …

Influence Of Wing Span On The Aerodynamics Of Wings In Ground Effect, Sammy Diasinos, Tracie J. Barber, Graham Doig

Aerospace Engineering

A computational fluid dynamics study of the influence of wing span has been conducted for an inverted wing with endplates in ground effect. Aerodynamic coefficients were determined for different spans at different ground clearances, highlighting a trend for shorter spans to delay the onset of both separation and resulting loss of negative lift. The vortices at the wing endplates were not observed to change significantly in terms of strength and size; thus, at shorter spans, their influence over a larger percentage of the wing helped the flow stay attached and reduced the severity of the adverse pressure gradient which invokes …

Shear-Wave Velocity–Based Probabilistic And Deterministic Assessment Of Seismic Soil Liquefaction Potential, R. Kayen, R. E.S. Moss, E.M. Thompson, R. B. Seed, K. O. Cetin, A. Der Kiureghian, Y. Tanaka, K. Tokimatsu

Civil and Environmental Engineering

Shear-wave velocity (Vs) offers a means to determine the seismic resistance of soil to liquefaction by a fundamental soil property. This paper presents the results of an 11-year international project to gather new Vssite data and develop probabilistic correlations for seismic soil liquefaction occurrence. Toward that objective, shear-wave velocity test sites were identified, and measurements made for 301 new liquefaction field case histories in China, Japan, Taiwan, Greece, and the United States over a decade. The majority of these new case histories reoccupy those previously investigated by penetration testing. These new data are combined with previously published case histories to …

Csp Desalination/Water Purification Unit, Sean Goodison

Industrial Technology and Packaging

An estimated 3.4 million people die each year from unsanitary water or inaccessible water supply. Most of these deaths take place in the developing, third world (99%). There is a dilemma arising on the world stage as well. The water demand/supply deficit is expected to increase significantly over the next 37 years if preemptive action isn’t taken. 97% of the world water supply is oceanic, making it an attractive solution to the water deficit. Providing autonomous, “deploy and watch” systems for utilizing sustainable energy to provide purified water for unitized low pricing has the potential to penetrate a large world …

Liquifaction At Strong Motion Stations And In Urayasu City During The 2011 Tohoku-Oki Earthquake, Brady R. Cox, Ross W. Boulanger, Kohji Tokimatsu, Clinton M. Wood, Akio Abe, Scott Ashford, Jennifer Donahue, Kenji Ishihara, Robert Kayen, Kota Katsumata, Tadahiro Kishida, Takaji Kokusho, H. Benjamin Mason, Robb Moss, Jonathan P. Stewart, Kazushi Tohyama, Dimitios Zekkos

Civil and Environmental Engineering

The 2011 M_W = 9.0 Tohoku-oki earthquake generated a large number of unique soil liquefaction case histories, including cases with strong ground motion recordings on liquefiable or potentially liquefiable soils. We have compiled a list of 22 strong motion stations (SMS) where surface evidence of liquefaction was observed and 16 SMS underlain by geologically recent sediments or fills where surface evidence of liquefaction was not observed. Pre-earthquake standard penetration test data and borehole shear wave velocity (V_s) profiles are available for some stations, but critical information, such as grain size distribution and fines plasticity, are often …

Evaluation And Design Of Potting Production Process Improvements For The Non-Profit Organization, Growing Grounds Farm, Maiya Avalon Bourland, Precilla Tang

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

This report focuses on the potting production process for the non-profit organization (NPO) Growing Grounds Farm (GGF), and aims to promote a standardized workflow system to enhance the working experience for Transitions‐Mental Health Association employees and volunteers. This project takes careful consideration into the process improvements proposed so to support the double bottom line of economic and social objectives. To address the equally important objectives, the Human Centered Design toolkit created by IDEO, specifically for third sector organizations, was integrated with the traditional Industrial Engineering design process methodology. Feasible alternatives were developed and evaluated based on the objectives. The selected …

Design Of An Automated Employee Scheduling System, Matthew Cameron, Yuriy Goldman

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Many retail stores, as well as other organizations that employ a multitude of part-time employees, rely on developing schedules frequently, since the availabilities of the employees as well as the needs of the business change often. This process is often performed on a weekly basis, and is complex and time-consuming. The schedule must typically satisfy numerous requirements, including business needs, legal restrictions, and employee availability constraints. As a result, errors are common, and employee time that could have been spent on improving sales or operations is instead consumed by the scheduling task.

This project explores two solution methods for this …

Atk's Radial Airframe Forming Process Assessment, Andres Martinez

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

The purpose of this project was to provide ATK with a solution to increase efficiency in the R-02 radial forming center so that it could meet the increase in demand projected for the next 5 years. In addition, give ATK projected dates of when new machines would need to be implemented to be able to keep up with the demand. The system was analyzed through time studies to identify areas of possible improvement and eliminate any non-value added activities. Cycle times of each activity were used to simulate the current state of the system using ProModel software. Changes in operations …

Restaurant Design: An Industrial Engineering Perspective, Joseph Travis Spanu

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

The objective of this paper is to design a health food restaurant using current industrial engineering tools and practices. This includes creating a menu, determining the average gross profit per customer, determining the location, designing a 3-d layout, simulating service, and analyzing local food supply chains. Using a simplified menu and pricing quotes from a food distributor, the average gross profit per customer is estimated to be $3.50. Location is determined by comparing the predicted number of customers and the cost to rent at two different areas. A downtown location is determined to gross approximately $5,200 per month over a …

Robert E. Kennedy Library Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo Fire Protection Analysis Fpe Culminating Project, Isaac De Haro Martinez

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

California State University has acquired fire protection services to conduct a survey of and produce a fire protection report that analyzes the current condition of the existing Robert E. Kennedy Library on the Cal Poly campus. The prescriptive analysis of the Library is based on the 2010 California Building- the analysis considers the building a new building and will not consider the building provision for existing buildings as permitted by Chapter 34 of the CBC. A performance-based design using FDS is also analyzed to determine the tenability advantages of providing fire sprinklers within the Library. Non-conforming conditions include, among others, …

Implementing A Matlab Based Attitude Determination Algorithm In C Within The Polysat Software Architecture, Dominic Bertolino

Computer Engineering

This project focuses on one component within a complete attitude determination and control system (ADCS) for a small satellite. The component consists of porting the algorithm that determines the current attitude of the satellite developed by AERO students / team members. The original algorithm has been developed in MATLAB code. The actual algorithm will be simulated and tested in MATLAB by the AEROs. The porting consisted of integrating the pieces into the custom PolySat software environment in C. Testing was done to verify the ported component corresponded to the original MATLAB component as well as verify its runtime on the …

Senior Project Report - Doctest, Stephen Weessies

Computer Engineering

DocTest is a program that, simply put, allows a programmer or user to document STANAG 4586 (a standard for unmanned aerial vehicle interoperability) messages and test the vehicle system at Lockheed Martin [5]. The program is extensible to allow for further development aiding our software team to do what they do best and not get bogged down in tedious but necessary documentation. DocTest is also used to aid in testing, keeping track of the issues and bugs found and creating a document that captures each issue so an issue is not missed or forgotten. This program was made for use …

Court House Project- Fire Protection Report, Ryan Rigsbee

Fire Protection Engineering: Culminating Experience Project Reports

This fire protection report intends to provide Fictitious Architects (The Client) with sufficient information about code requirements and best practices pertaining to occupant and building safety. The chapters within this report include specific design requirements to aid the client during the design of the Court House Project. The following recommendations have been prepared by Ryan Rigsbee to address all major building code requirements for life safety systems. These life safety systems include egress, fire alarm and signaling, water-based fire suppression, structural fire protection, smoke control, and an emergency management plan. This project details the requirements for a new courthouse containing …

Novel Approach To Junctional Bleeding: Tourniquet Device Proposal For Battlefield Hemorrhage Control, Kyle W. Cabaniss

Master's Theses

This study investigated possible solutions to the current wartime problem of junctional hemorrhaging, or massive traumatic hemorrhaging in non-tourinquetable areas such as the neck, groin, or armpit. Junctional hemorrhaging has been identified as a major contributor to potentially survivable deaths seen on the battlefield today and therefore is a priority for the U.S. armed and coalition forces (Kragh et al., 2011a; Bozeman, 2011). Common tourniquets today are standard issue and carried by soldiers in the military, but are limited to distal extremity trauma. As the battlefield has changes however, trauma has transformed from commonly seen gunshot wounds to more extreme …

A Gravity Gradient, Momentum-Biased Attitude Control System For A Cubesat, Ryan J. Sellers

Master's Theses

ExoCube is the latest National Science Foundation (NSF) funded space weather CubeSat and is a collaboration between PolySat, Scientific Solutions Inc. (SSI), the University of Wisconsin, NASA Goddard and SRI International. The 3U will carry a mass spectrometer sensor suite, EXOS, in to low earth orbit (LEO) to measure neutral and ionized particles in the exosphere and thermosphere. Measurements of neutral and ion particles are directly impacted by the angle at which they enter EXOS and which leads to pointing requirements. A combination of a gravity gradient system with a momentum bias wheel is proposed to meet pointing requirements while …

Caddy: A 2005 Roborodentia Entry With Vision And Path Planning Abilities, Taylor Braun-Jones

Computer Engineering

Roborodentia is an autonomous robotics competition held each year during Cal Poly’s Open House. For the 2005 competition, robot entries needed to navigate a maze searching for three randomly placed golf balls, collect them, and then deposit the balls in the “nest” at the end of the maze. A newly added aspect for the 2005 competition included two bonus balls that were placed on a platform behind the wall in two predetermined corners of the maze.

Caddy is a robot that was entered into the 2005 Roborodentia competition. Caddy included a vision system that allowed searching for balls down untraveled …