Engineering Commons^™

Seestar Iii Sensor Module, Matthew M. Ducasse

Electrical Engineering

SeeStar is an autonomous, underwater camera system for observing aquatic environments. The Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) developed SeeStar to provide a low cost solution for marine researchers wishing to observe underwater ecosystems over long durations. The system consists of completely open-source designs featuring only common, commercially available components. This means users may purchase the components and build the system themselves. While MBARI originally intended for the system to simply capture photo and video data, many customers have requested additional sensors to gather contextual data to complement the captured images. The latest generation, SeeStar III, features a sensor module, …

Optimization And Experimental Application Of Current Stimuli To Leech Pressure-Sensitive Mechanosensory Cells, Alexandra C. Ferguson

Masters Theses

The WMU Neurobiology Engineering Lab has previously utilized a "Reduced Energy Input Stimulus Discovery Method" to compute reduced energy stimuli which evoke desired neuron responses. This approach is based on applying an optimal control method to conductance-based neuron models. Initial experimental feasibility of using the discovered optimal currents has been previously demonstrated using leech pressure-sensitive mechanosensory neurons. This work validates and analyzes experimental application of this method. Based on this analysis, an `informed' neuron model is developed by adjusting parameters to minimize error between results from the informed model and experimental data. The informed model is used to find optimal …

Redesign Of The Medtronic Kyphon Bone Cement Mixer For Vertebral Compression Fractures, Mollie Benson, Sarah Freesemann, Aj Konnath, Benjamin Murray

Biomedical Engineering

The complete senior project report was submitted to the project advisor and sponsor. The results of this project are of a confidential nature and will not be published at this time.

Effects Of Vegetation On Slope Stability: A Review, Roberto José Marín Sánchez, Juan Pablo Osorio

Articles

Slope stability is usually affected by factors that reduce soil strength and increase driving forces acting on the slope material, sometimes generating mass movements. Among these factors, vegetation has an important role related to hydrological (e.g. evapotranspiration and infiltration) and mechanical (e.g. tree surcharge and root reinforcement provided by trees) mechanisms. In this review, vegetation influences associated to slope stability are identified, describing the mechanisms involved in the occurrence of mass movements. Finally, the way these factors affect slope stability is explained according to soil properties, climatic conditions and environmental characteristics.

Multi-Fidelity Model Predictive Control Of Upstream Energy Production Processes, Ammon Nephi Eaton

Theses and Dissertations

Increasing worldwide demand for petroleum motivates greater efficiency, safety, and environmental responsibility in upstream oil and gas processes. The objective of this research is to improve these areas with advanced control methods. This work develops the integration of optimal control methods including model predictive control, moving horizon estimation, high fidelity simulators, and switched control techniques applied to subsea riser slugging and managed pressure drilling. A subsea riser slugging model predictive controller eliminates persistent offset and decreases settling time by 5% compared to a traditional PID controller. A sensitivity analysis shows the effect of riser base pressure sensor location on controller …

Diy Grip Tape Website, Jason E. Krein

Computer Science and Software Engineering

The goal of this senior project was to create an easy to use website that will allow people to design and order their own custom skateboard grip tape. Custom skateboard decks are a large business, however the top, more visible, part of the board is largely ignored by custom shops. With the help of a local entrepreneur, I aim to enable skateboarders the ability to get custom grip tape shapes that they can stick on their board to spice it up from the normal black tape that everyone uses. The website was completed over the course of 4 months, in …

Gridiron-Gurus Final Report: Fantasy Football Performance Prediction, Kyle Tanemura, Michael Li, Erica Dorn, Ryan Mckinney

Computer Science and Software Engineering

Gridiron Gurus is a desktop application that allows for the creation of custom AI profiles to help advise and compete against in a Fantasy Football setting. Our AI are capable of performing statistical prediction of players on both a season long and week to week basis giving them the ability to both draft and manage a fantasy football team throughout a season.

Recommendation Of A New Transit Performance Measure In The National Transit Database, Fatemeh Baratian-Ghorghi, Hossein Ahmadianyazdi

Journal of Public Transportation

The frequency of incidents negatively changes public perception with regard to the public safety in transit systems. The level of safety expressed as performance measures, ensures contractors and users that a quality safety level is maintained. Both the private and public sectors in the U.S. annually report accurate data to the National Transit Database (NTD) to be used in assessing the progress of the nation's public transportation systems. Although they must provide both the annual report and monthly reports including Safety and Security data, measures are only grouped into the indicators of efficiency and effectiveness of a system and there …

A Fuzzy Ahp Approach To Compare Transit System Performance In Us Urbanized Areas, Xin Li, Yingling Fan, John W. Shaw, Yunlei Qi

Journal of Public Transportation

Public transit systems in the United States often face multiple policy objectives. Typically, stakeholders desire frequent service on an extensive network, but funding and other resources are constrained, creating complicated relationships between service effectiveness goals and business efficiency goals. Using data from the National Transit Map (NTM), this study evaluated the general performance of transit systems across 294 Urbanized Areas (UZAs) in the US, which were stratified into six peer groups based on population. Transit efficiency and effectiveness were compared by developing a composite business efficiency index score and a composite service effectiveness index score for each urbanized area. The …

Assessment Methods From Around The World Potentially Useful For Public Transport Projects, Eric Bruun, Marianne Vanderschuren

Journal of Public Transportation

The financial crisis in 2008/2009 has made many countries aware that public funds need to be managed better. A logical step is to identify methods that thoroughly assess the impacts of infrastructure and service investment. The authors argue that assessments should both identify and use performance indicators related to the ‘triple bottom line’, i.e. economic, social and environmental impacts.

This paper provides an overview of assessment methods used to evaluate public transport investments. Positive and negative aspects of various assessment tools are identified and discussed. Some developing world examples appear to be more elaborate and appropriate, than developed world examples, …

Jfs Turbine Engine For Cal Poly Mechanical Engineering Department, Dorian Capps, Zoe Kai Tuggle

Mechanical Engineering

This project concerns the development of a gas turbine engine laboratory activity for use in one of Cal Poly’s technical elective courses in the Mechanical Engineering Department, ME 444: Combustion Engine Design. The class is taught by Dr. Patrick Lemieux, who is also in charge of the on-campus engines lab where the turbine engine will be installed. The engine itself is a JFS-100-13A turboshaft engine that will be coupled to an electric dynamometer inside of the dyno test cell. Students taking the ME 444 class, likely starting in Winter Quarter of 2018, will be able to perform hands-on experiments using …

Soft Target For Advanced Emergency Braking System Daimler Trucks, Kurt C. Ebert, Kolter Knapp, Esgar Pulido

Mechanical Engineering

This report provides an overview of the AEBS Soft Target project delivered to Daimler Trucks North Amer- ica as part of the 2016-2017 Mechanical Engineering Senior Design class at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. The purpose was to build a soft target to test Advanced Emergency Braking Systems, or AEBS, on Daimler 0 s large trucks. Though this design is for Daimler specifically, there may be other interested parties such as highway safety groups and rival auto manufacturers. Currently, there are no suitable alternative products that satisfy every requirement for Daimler to validate their systems. They require a …

Additive Manufacturing For Post-Processing, Nathan D. Goodwin, Andrew Furmidge

Mechanical Engineering

Additive Manufacturing for Post Processing (AMPP) is a team comprised of two Cal Poly Mechanical Engineering students: Nathan Goodwin and Andrew Furmidge. The project is focused in the area of metal additive manufacturing (AM) machines, which are still a developing technology. Improvements have been made to the quality of the machines in the past years, but many limitations still exist. One of these is the inability to print parts that are larger than the build volume. In an effort to solve this problem, whole parts are divided into pieces that are printed individually. This team’s senior project is to create …

Bear Minimum: Ultralight Composite Bear Canister, Rama B. Adajian, Adam C. Eisenbarth

Mechanical Engineering

The ultralight backpacking community needs a strong, easy to use, safe bear canister that is lighter than current market products for trekking in the backcountry. A full design of the lid for the bear canister is to be completed. This includes the locking mechanism to ensure it is bear proof, the interface between the lid and the canister, and the structure of the lid so it passes the strength and weight specifications. The lid, along with the already designed canister body, is to be manufactured with formal documentation. The lid will initially be tested separately and then with the canister …

Self-Powered Ankle Prosthetic, Corina M. Espelien, Kelsey Pietzsch, Anna Sullivan

Mechanical Engineering

Originating from QL+'s customer requirements, the main technical specifications were to have 80% physiological range of motion, elastic energy return, impact absorption, and no external power sources. Based on the background research conducted and the discussions with experts in the field, the project team decided to focus on designing a prosthetic that focused on plantarflexion and dorsiflexion for a more comfortable gait. The main components of the final design are a hydraulic shock absorber, cam, torsion springs, heel, stopper, and separated keel. The heel, front and back keels, and stopper were manufactured out of carbon fiber. The link, lever, attachment …

Prototype Vehicles Laboratory Steering Apparatus, Zachary W. Sharpell, Jorge Lopez, Colby R. Genasci

Mechanical Engineering

The Cal Poly Prototype Vehicles Team (PROVE) is designing a solar powered vehicle to break an international land speed record. The space within the driver’s cockpit allotted for the steering mechanism was too small for a conventional steering wheel. This report describes the process that was followed to design, manufacture, and test a compact and lightweight steering apparatus for the PROVE solar vehicle. A lateral lever steering system, the final design selected for PROVE’s solar car, was designed to withstand the maximum expected loads applied by the driver during the three-minute run of the competition. The lateral lever steering apparatus …

Device To Standardize Leaflet Droop Testing, Mark Butler, Daniel Lussier, Kyle Timm

Mechanical Engineering

No abstract provided.

Logic Tiles, Andrew Wheeler, Tristan Lennertz

Computer Engineering

This project was originally conceived by Professor Andrew Danowitz as he considered the restructuring of the introductory digital design course at Cal Poly. As it stands now, students apply their knowledge of boolean algebra and combinatorial logic through the programming of a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) using a Hardware Descriptive Language (HDL). While this is the industry standard for designing large, complex digital circuits, and is an fundamental skill to learn, there is a lack of actual circuit building in the process that can cause a disconnect from theory to application for students who have little-to-no experience with digital …

Smartfarm, Nathan A. Oto, Caleb Fink

Computer Engineering

The overall expectation of this product is to create an autonomous Arduino library that accurately and robustly collects plant environment data from the Smart Farm board. The Smart Farm PCB is split into two primary functions: Data Acquisition(DAQ) and Power Control. Each function of the PCB is controlled by an Atmega 328P Microcontroller. The primary concern for this report is the functionality of the DAQ microcontroller.

Underwater Computer Vision - Fish Recognition, Spencer Chang, Austin Otto

Computer Engineering

The Underwater Computer Vision – Fish Recognition project includes the design and implementation of a device that can withstand staying underwater for a duration of time, take pictures of underwater creatures, such as fish, and be able to identify certain fish. The system is meant to be cheap to create, yet still able to process the images it takes and identify the objects in the pictures with some accuracy. The device can output its results to another device or an end user.

Multispectral Identification Array, Zachary D. Eagan

Computer Engineering

The Multispectral Identification Array is a device for taking full image spectroscopy data via the illumination of a subject with sixty-four unique spectra. The array combines images under the illumination spectra to produce an approximate reflectance graph for every pixel in a scene. Acquisition of an entire spectrum allows the array to differentiate objects based on surface material. Spectral graphs produced are highly approximate and should not be used to determine material properties, however the output is sufficiently consistent to allow differentiation and identification of previously sampled subjects. While not sufficiently advanced for use as a replacement to spectroscopy the …

M3 Pi: Obd-Ii Touchscreen Car Computer, Geoffrey Wacker

Computer Engineering

There are a wide range of off-the-shelf OBD-II car computers available for purchase, but the majority of them are either prohibitively expensive or simply unreliable. Furthermore, almost all of these devices are closed-box systems that cannot be expanded or modified. As such, this project aims to create a Raspberry Pi-powered OBD-II car computer that will allow data from the ECU of a 1997 BMW M3 to be displayed on an interactive touchscreen GUI. This will allow the user to quickly monitor important information about the vehicle during high performance applications such as track use. The end product should be low-cost, …

Sublimesurf, Nathan Sfard, Karis Russell

Computer Engineering

Surf conditions change rapidly day to day and location to location, which forces modern day surfers to utilize online forecasts and obtain a detailed knowledge of the places they want to surf. To ease this pain, we are developing SublimeSurf, an iOS application that will keep track of the current surf conditions and allow users to rate aspects of the surf. We plan to use this rating data in combination with surf forecast data available online to notify a user when conditions look favorable, based on their previous ratings. We also intend to mine the data submitted by all users …

Greenbin, Jessica Chao

Computer Engineering

Greenbin is an iteration of a larger project to implement a zero-waste container tracking system for use in Cal Poly’s dining facilities. The system utilizes a database system as well as passive RFID technologies to track the checking-in and checking-out of plastic reusable food containers. These plastic food containers can be checked out by campus dining patrons, and returned autonomously to collection bins that contain these scanners, allowing the containers to be recollected, re-accounted for, and reused.

Design And Proof Of Concept Of Parking Garage Capacity Network Using Distributed Ultrasonic Devices Interfaced With Mqtt Protocol, Justin M. Distaso, Erik C. Olsen

Computer Engineering

This paper overviews the Smart Structure project. We found a desire from the City of San Luis Obispo for a way to tell the availability of parking spaces in local parking garages. In addition to meeting this need the project aims to provide functionality and adaptability based on future “smart” devices and making the device fit into an Internet of Things (IoT) system. Currently drivers must manually navigate the parking garage to determine which floor has a parking spot. With our proposed solution drivers would be able to tell at a glance which floors had the most spots, as well …

Dungeon Master’S Sheet Aid, Alex F. Grazela

Computer Engineering

The Dungeon Master’s Sheet Aid is a program made to assist players of tabletop rpg games in keeping track of and using their “character sheets”, a vital part of the game. In particular. It is made to be helpful to the players taking the role of “Dungeon” or “Game” Master, as these players need to manage many more character sheets than anyone else.

Smartgarden, Samuel S. Lees, Matthew T. Lindly

Computer Engineering

The problem that the SmartGarden project seeks to solve is the challenge of watering succulents correctly and maintaining consistent plant health. Too much water can cause root rot and drowning while too little water can cause dehydration and starvation.
The SmartGarden solves this common problem by configuring a Raspberry Pi to measure soil moisture, store the data to an AWS server in the cloud, and water the succulent when necessary, informing the user by providing both a web-interface and a variety of notifications.

The Following Robot, Juan D. Cerda, Matthew S. Kwan, Vi M. Le

Computer Engineering

The objective of this project is to design, build, and test an autonomous robot with an associated Android application. The robot uses on board inertial measurement sensors (magnetometer, accelerometer, gyroscope) and coordinates itself through Bluetooth communication with the similar built­in measurement sensors on the Android phone to mimic and follow movement. The Following Robot incorporates the same basic movement functionality as a typical RC car. The robot follows the user’s phone through an application on one’s phone. This application accesses the phone’s accelerometer and gyroscope data and translates into appropriate conversions. Methods of tracking and calculating distance or angular displacement …

Modeling Autonomous Vehicles Through Radio Controlled Cars, Eva S. Chen

Computer Engineering

Autonomous vehicles have a lot of potential in improving people’s everyday lives. They could reduce congestion, reduce collisions, enhance mobility, and more. But with these benefits come security and privacy risks. In order to research and test some of these risks, we are building a set of scale autonomous cars that can model autonomous and collaborative behaviors. One such behaviour would be platooning, where a group of vehicles can travel closely together at high speeds by following a lead car. We are doing this with various sensors and control algorithms to allow for future modularity.

Target Reliability Approach To Study The Effect Of Fiber Reinforcement On Ucs Behavior Of Lime Treated Semi-Arid Soil, Arif Ali Baig Moghal, Bhaskar C.S. Chittoori, B. Munwar Basha, Mosleh Ali Al-Shamrani

Civil Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper evaluates the effectiveness of stabilizing expansive soil with two different types of fibers, Fiber Mesh® (FM) and Fiber Cast® (FC), in conjunction with chemical stabilization. The intention of this study is to evaluate the effect of these fibers and lime in stabilizing expansive soil by improving its UCS behavior. The effect of varying lengths (6 mm and 12 mm) and amounts (0.2, 0.4 and 0.6% dosage by weight of soil) of FC and FM fibers and curing periods (0, 7, 28, 60, 120, 180 and 360 days) on the UCS and on secant modulus of a semi-arid expansive …