Engineering Commons^™

The Role Of Namibian Youth In The Advancement Of Sustainable Energy, Samantha Anne Lindgren

Link Foundation Energy Fellowship Reports

Across low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), 3.1 billion people cook and heat their homes by burning solid fuels such as firewood, charcoal, and crop and animal waste [1], [2]. Approximately 80% of rural communities in LMICs rely on biomass [3] for their energy needs. The emissions from these fires, including carbon monoxide and particulate matter, result in household air pollution (HAP) that cause both acute and chronic illnesses leading to nearly three million premature deaths each year [4]–[6], and are a leading producer of black carbon emissions, a key climate-forcing agent [7]. Efficient, or improved, cookstoves are an energy solution …

Electrathon Vehicle: Steering, Lathan Halaapiapi

All Undergraduate Projects

The Electrathon Vehicle project is an ongoing project that dates back to 2012. The Electrathon Vehicle began as a frame and three wheels when given to the EV club. In past projects the vehicle has had frame and suspension work. The current design is only partially assembled and does not allow for any steering in the vehicle. A steering system needed to be developed in order for the vehicle to be controlled while a person is sitting in the seat. A steering system was designed that could withstand the force of maneuvering the vehicle in excess of 30 mph. This …

Discrete Concealed Device Table, Shyne Mckay

All Undergraduate Projects

How can people hide devices in their homes without being obvious with its location? People use safes to hide devices but intruders will know immediately that’s where things are held. It’s a common issue that people are having their safes stolen or broken into. To answer this question, a device was created to conceal devices in plain sight without being noticed. It’s common to have a coffee table in ones living room. Combining the problem with this knowledge, a discrete concealed device table was created. The table looks normal to the naked eye, meaning one cannot tell that the table …

J.C.A.T.I. Automated Pyrolysis Project, James Lopez

All Undergraduate Projects

Previous students working on the JCATI project have created an oven that will be used for the Pyrolysis process of carbon fiber composites. The oven requires someone to operate it manually, as in they must lift up the cover, place the amount of material desired, and stop the oven when it reaches the desired time. This process can and should be made automated. This was achieved by creating a device that can select the amount of material needed for a batch, automatically put it in the oven through the cover, and then bring the material out of the oven at …

Heat Exchanger, Chance Linarez

All Undergraduate Projects

A water jet cutting machine can cause excess heat and humidity within a closed building, while also making it more difficult for the user to pick material off the cutting table. Water temperatures can reach as high as 150 degrees Fahrenheit in the tank. A system that would reduce the temperature of the water in a water jet tank would be beneficial for the occupants in the room in providing a better more comfortable work environment. Data was collected while the machine was in use. The data includes; temperature of water leaving the nozzle, the rate of change of tank …

Carbon Fiber Composite Recycling, Wolfe Dennis

All Undergraduate Projects

During construction of Boeing’s aircrafts, carbon fiber reinforced composites are used as the primary material for the wings of the aircraft. Excess material during the manufacturing process is trimmed and discarded as waste. Although there is no viable process thus far, these trimmings have the potential to be recycled and reclaimed to be used in various other manufactured products. The trimmings of carbon fiber composite are approximately 10-12 layers of material bonded together. This project focuses on delaminating the trimmings into individual layers so that the carbon can be pyrolyzed from the bonding resin. In order to separate the layers …

Four Point Flexure Beam Fixture, Nikolay Bobritskiy

All Undergraduate Projects

Structural design is one of many important aspects in mechanical engineering. Newly discovered composites are making their way into the engineering world. These materials have certain properties which need to be tested in several ways before they can be put to application. One of such tests include the four-point bend test. The fixtures that can be purchased currently can be expensive, typically ranging from $700-$1,000. The University has been struggling to afford commercial jig at this cost and would be helpful if one were available. The device consists of a 6061-aluminum base making it light, cheap, and faster to manufacture …

Fire Fighter Robot, Mohammed Alhajri

All Undergraduate Projects

Mohammed Alhajri

Fire Fighter Robot

Abstract

This report talks about the firefighter robot which can be used for fighting against the fire and which can be controlled from a safe distance. The most important objectives of designing such a device were to design and implement a test environment. Also, the main objective was to design and fabricate the frame of the robot. Furthermore, it was necessary to design and implement a drive system. Some of the constraints in this project were that the designed robotic machine was not able to climb up the stairs. Also, the material was not able …

Asts Frame, Dustin Braun

All Undergraduate Projects

The automotive industry has been an industry of many breakthroughs in technology and mechanical systems over the course of its history. But in one area, its innovation has slowed. That is in the area of the short throw shifter. All aftermarket short throw shifters are currently one dimensional. No adjustability, no ability to finetune to one’s personal desire. The goal of this project is to create a short throw shifter frame that is easier/faster to install, as well as allow for full adjustability of the shifter from inside the car. This frame design uses mostly 6061-T6 aluminum, along with some …

Ev Mirror Project, David Castillo

All Undergraduate Projects

An ongoing project for the Electric Vehicle Club is to build a fully working Electric Vehicle that can be used for any of the Electrathon America races across the country. Like most cars, the vehicle would need safety equipment that would allow the driver of the vehicle to drive the course both safely and efficiently. The event has specific requirements for the safety equipment that require the driver to be able to see behind them or when another driver is approaching from behind. Therefore, this project objective was to design and manufacture a set of mirrors that satisfy this requirement. …

Cubesat 5000, Renee Redman

All Undergraduate Projects

Cubesat 5000 is designed for the annual Physics weather balloon launch which is done for the senior level astrophysics students. Students use the weather balloons to get better visuals of the sun in the upper atmosphere. The purpose of the Cubesat 5000 design is to keep the instrumentation inside safe during and after the launch, maintain working temperature, and to remain below a 400-gram weight requirements in order to achieve optimum altitude.

The outer cube assembly was designed using Solidworks and printed using PETG filament. The weight of the cube has been measured and design changes were made done to …

Catmobile Ev Front Suspension, Daymon Fritz

All Undergraduate Projects

The Central Washington University (CWU) Mechanical Engineering Technology (MET) program owns an electric vehicle called the “Cat-Mobile” designed to be entered into an Electrothon America race. The Cat-Mobile is a collaborative project, various aspects of which are built by CWU MET students in the capstone sequence of the senior year. For the Cat-Mobile to operate safely and effectively, it was necessary to design and build a proper front suspension system. The suspension needed to meet Electrothon America Handbook rules dictating a minimum ground clearance of 2” and optimize material usage to keep added weight at or below 20lbs. Loading and …

Package Conveyance Stability Project, Sadie Mensing

All Undergraduate Projects

Dematic’s new model of conveyor is called the 9570 unit and is a highspeed live roller conveyor. This new model is designed to transport packages while maintaining a high speed of at least 3 m/s. While this new unit was being tested at the Dematic Tech center, it was discovered that when small and light weight packages get diverted onto the unit, they experience turbulence which causes the packages to spin or flip over. Orientation of packages on conveyor is extremely important for scanning purposes. In order to fix this problem, the problem first had to be replicated. A piece …

Speed Bump Power Generator, Sultan Alanazi, Osamah Abulgaith

All Undergraduate Projects

A large amount of energy is wasted by the vehicles on the speed breakers through friction. Energy can be produced by using the vehicle weight and speed. The team proposes a smart speed breaker that generates power (Speed bump power generator). The device allows vehicles to pass from both sides. The system makes use of mechanical assembly with metal sheets with linkages that press down with spring arrangement. Using the motion and weight of vehicles was the method that the team relied on to design the device. The mass of the vehicles allows the top plate to move the rack …

Automatic Bead Stringing Machine, Huy Dinh

All Undergraduate Projects

Humans were able to master the process of piercing objects through drilling holes as an advanced beading technique. There would be a great demand for beads and they appear more and more in human daily life. Many things are made from bead strings such as jewelry, furniture and house decoration. The beading process is usually done manually by hands of workers. The process takes a lot of effort and cost for labor. Therefore, this project is about building a simple device that helps to free the work effort and lower the labor cost. The bead strings machine has 3 main …

Flexor Casting, Courtney Lehrman

All Undergraduate Projects

Abstract: Strain gauge bases (Flexors) are scarce in the Mechanical Engineering Department. Flexors are used for MET lab classes to collect and analyze data so it is important for there to be more Flexors available. In order to acquire more, resources are available on campus such as the foundry and the machine shop in order to support the manufacturing of more Flexors in-house at a much lower cost. By creating a pattern that can be used numerous times in a foundry, not only will there be an opportunity to make more castings for students to use, there will not be …

Dual-Axis Solar Tracker, Bryan Kennedy

All Undergraduate Projects

Renewable energies, and fuels that are not fossil fuel-based, are one of the prolific topics of debate in modern society. With climate change now becoming a primary focus for scientists and innovators of today, one of the areas for the largest amount of potential and growth is that of the capturing and utilization of Solar Energy. This method involves using a mechanical system to track the progression of the sun as it traverses the sky throughout the day. A dual-axis solar tracker such as the one designed and built for this project, can follow the sun both azimuthally and in …

Mechanical Lift Assist Hoist, Jacob Vanblaricom

All Undergraduate Projects

Pneumatic Gripper for Cast Products

By: Jacob VanBlaricom

Mentors: Craig Johnson ([email protected]), Kurt Gray ([email protected] ),

Ted Bramble ([email protected]) , Travis Lamberte ([email protected] )

The Team was tasked by NorthStar Casteel to create a device that would allow for easy mobility and manipulation of unfinished cast products. The device is needed to increase manufacturing time and decrease worker strain. In order to do this the team designed a custom gripper to match the castings produced at this facility. The gripper was powered by a pneumatic system due to the speed and reliability in this …

A Half-Yearly Newsletter Of The Department Of Mechatronics V2 S2 [Jan 2020], Chandrashekhar Bhat Dr

Faculty work

No abstract provided.

A Half- Yearly E-Newsletter Of The Department Of Computer Science And Engineering, Manipal Institute Of Technology - Jan 2020, Ashalatha Nayak

Faculty work

No abstract provided.

Deployment Of Deep Reinforcement Learning Algorithms On Physical Robotic Systems, P. Surya .

Manipal Institute of Technology, Manipal Theses and Dissertations

In the recent years, Reinforcement Learning (RL), has surfaced as an impressive tool for solving complex sequential decision-making problems in control theory. Its major grasp on control theory has been on Markov decision problems (MDP) and its variants. It overcomes the long observed problems of the curse of dimensionality and the curse of modeling. This outperforms the classical Dynamic Programming (DP) that falter under these curses. The work is to use this advantage in our favour to leverage autonomous navigation in a model learnable environment or otherwise. The work involves the use of a Meta OS called Robot Operating System …

How Facets Of Work Illuminate Sociotechnical Challenges Of Industry 5.0, Steven Alter

Business Analytics and Information Systems

This conceptual contribution explains how the idea of “facets of work” can refocus traditional sociotechnical concerns to increase their relevance in increasingly automated and digitalized workplaces far removed from situations studied by early sociotechnical researchers. A background section summarizes how the sociotechnical approach seems pervasive but possibly outdated in some ways. It explains how the idea of “facets of work” emerged from attempting to bring richer, more evocative ide-as to systems analysis and design. Focusing on facets of work during initial discussions of requirements could provide guidance without jumping prematurely to precision and notation needed for producing technical artifacts. Tables …

Applying Facets Of Work As A Source Of Knowledge And Insight For Requirements Determination, Steven Alter

Business Analytics and Information Systems

This conceptual contribution explains how the idea of “facets of work” can bring more knowledge and richer, more evocative ideas to the development of system requirements in organizational settings. Focusing on facets of work potentially provides useful guidance without requiring unnecessary details, precision, and notation. A background section summarizes how the current research emerged from partial overlaps between separate research efforts. Table 1 identifies 18 facets of work. Five other tables look at a subset of the facets to illustrate concepts associated with specific facets, common success factors and tradeoffs, sub-facets and other topics. Use of the same subset of …

Exploring Pattern Mining Algorithms For Hashtag Retrieval Problem, Asma Belhadi, Youcef Djenouri, Jerry Chun-Wei Lin, Chongsheng Zhang, Alberto Cano

Computer Science Publications

Hashtag is an iconic feature to retrieve the hot topics of discussion on Twitter or other social networks. This paper incorporates the pattern mining approaches to improve the accuracy of retrieving the relevant information and speeding up the search performance. A novel algorithm called PM-HR (Pattern Mining for Hashtag Retrieval) is designed to first transform the set of tweets into a transactional database by considering two different strategies (trivial and temporal). After that, the set of the relevant patterns is discovered, and then used as a knowledge-based system for finding the relevant tweets based on users' queries under the similarity …

College Of Computing And Engineering Graduate Catalog 2020-2021, Nova Southeastern University

College of Engineering and Computing Course Catalogs

No abstract provided.

Effects Of Surface Heterogeneity Due To Drip Irrigation On Scintillometer Estimates Of Sensible, Latent Heat Fluxes And Evapotranspiration Over Vineyards, Hatim M. E. Geli, José González-Piqueras, Christopher M. U. Neale, Claudio Balbontín, Isidro Campos, Alfonso Calera

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Accurate estimates of sensible (H) and latent (LE) heat fluxes and actual evapotranspiration (ET) are required for monitoring vegetation growth and improved agricultural water management. A large aperture scintillometer (LAS) was used to provide these estimates with the objective of quantifying the effects of surface heterogeneity due to soil moisture and vegetation growth variability. The study was conducted over drip-irrigated vineyards located in a semi-arid region in Albacete, Spain during summer 2007. Surface heterogeneity was characterized by integrating eddy covariance (EC) observations of H, LE and ET; land surface temperature (LST) and normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) data from Landsat …

Assessment Of An Automated Calibration Of The Sebal Algorithm To Estimate Dry-Season Surface-Energy Partitioning In A Forest–Savanna Transition In Brazil, Leonardo Laipelt, Anderson Luis Ruhoff, Ayan Santos Fleischmann, Rafael Henrique Bloedow Kayser, Elisa De Mello Kich, Humberto Ribeiro Da Rocha, Christopher Michael Usher Neale

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Evapotranspiration (ET) provides a strong connection between surface energy and hydrological cycles. Advancements in remote sensing techniques have increased our understanding of energy and terrestrial water balances as well as the interaction between surface and atmosphere over large areas. In this study, we computed surface energy fluxes using the Surface Energy Balance Algorithm for Land (SEBAL) algorithm and a simplified adaptation of the CIMEC (Calibration using Inverse Modeling at Extreme Conditions) process for automated endmember selection. Our main purpose was to assess and compare the accuracy of the automated calibration of the SEBAL algorithm using two different sources of meteorological …

Treenuts And Groundnuts In The Eat-Lancet Reference Diet: Concerns Regarding Sustainable Water Use, Davy Vanhama, Mesfin Mekonnen, Arjen Y. Hoekstra

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

The EAT-Lancet universal healthy reference diet recommends an increase in the consumption of healthy foods, among which treenuts and groundnuts. Both are, however, water-intensive products, with a large water footprint (WF) per unit of mass and protein and already today contribute to blue water stress in different parts of the world. The envisaged massive required increase in nut production to feed a global population with this reference diet, needs to occur in a water-sustainable way. In this paper, we identify and quantify where current nut production contributes to local blue water stress and discuss options for water-sustainable nut production. We …

Water Productivity Benchmarks: The Case Of Maize And Soybean In Nebraska, Mesfin Mekonnen, Arjen Y. Hoekstra, Christopher Michael Usher Neale, Chittaranjan Ray, Haishun Yang

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Water productivity benchmarks for irrigated and rainfed agriculture will provide relevant information to manage scarce water resources and control groundwater level decline. We analyze the temporal and spatial variation of the water productivity (WP) of maize and soybean in Nebraska, with WP defined as harvested crop weight per total evapotranspiration. The results show that WP of both maize and soybean increase from west to east within Nebraska and have increased over the last 25 years, mainly due to the increase in crop yields (land productivity). We derive WP benchmarks for each crop per climate zone. Increasing actual WPs in the …

Potential Of Using Spectral Vegetation Indices For Corn Green Biomass Estimation Based On Their Relationship With The Photosynthetic Vegetation Sub-Pixel Fraction, Luan Peroni Venancio, Everardo Chartuni Mantovani, Cibele Hummel Do Amaral, Christopher M.U. Neale, Ivo Zution Gonçalves, Roberto Filgueiras, Fernando Coelho Eugenio

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Crop biomass (Bio) is one of the most important parameters of a crop, and knowledge of it before harvest is essential to help farmers in their decision making. Both green and dry Bio can be estimated from vegetation spectral indices (VIs) because they have a close relationship with accumulated absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (APAR), which is proportional to total Bio. The aims of this study were to analyze the potential capacity of spectral vegetation indices in estimating corn green biomass based on their relationship with the photosynthetic vegetation sub-pixel fraction derived from spectral mixture analysis and to analyze the best …