Combining Design And Manufacturing Into A First Year Course

For several decades, Kettering University has taught an introductory course for first year engineering students to acquaint them with the manufacturing processes that they might encounter as part of their cooperative work experience. The revision of the curriculum in 2001 caused a redesign of the course and added some design experiences to further enhance the educational process. This paper discusses the development of the new course called Interdisciplinary Design and Manufacturing and discusses relationship of course coverage to the SME competency gaps. The manufacturing portion describes the lecture topics and laboratory experiments that were an integral part of the course. The mechanical and electrical design portions describe the use of commercial toys and a self-designed toy platform that formed the basis of the new design laboratory portion of the class. It will be demonstrated that it is possible to make a meaningful first year experience for all engineering students combining mechanical and electrical design with manufacturing theory and laboratory. Development of a Philosophy: Kettering University is a cooperative education university where students begin their cooperative work experience at the beginning of their first year and alternate school and work in three-month increments throughout their five-year academic experience. This close-coupled relationship of work and school requires the students to become knowledgeable in manufacturing processes as most of the work experiences begin with assignments in the manufacturing operations of their industrial environment. During the curriculum reform, it was decided to add a design component to the course. When first conceived, it was believed that the design and manufacturing portions of the course could be close-coupled such that the extensive manufacturing laboratory facilities available at Kettering University could be used to create prototypes of the design projects. Weekly meetings with an interdisciplinary team of faculty developed interesting projects but topics that would not lend themselves to the close-coupling philosophy. The major obstacle was that the manufacturing facilities would be used in a non-traditional manner and would not allow the students to see the proper utilization of the equipment. An example of this would be using a P ge 703.1 “Proceedings of the 2002 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2002, American Society for Engineering Education lathe running at very low speeds to wind an electrical coil. The end could be achieved but the means would not create the educational outcome desired. The close-coupling concept was difficult to discard but the impossibility of implementing that philosophy for the class was conceded. When the design projects were totally separated from the manufacturing projects, success was achieved. The design portion would not require any physical manufacturing to occur. Any manufacturing ideas arising from the design labs would be “paper solutions” only and not physically-realized ones. The use of the manufacturing facilities was limited to a fixed set of experiences directed at helping the students understand materials and their manufacturing processes. In addition to the carry-over manufacturing topics and laboratory from the previously taught course, both mechanical and electrical design were added. This resulted in a course with two hours of manufacturing lecture a week and four hours of hands-on laboratory per week – two of manufacturing and two of either mechanical design or electrical design (sections were exchanged between these classes midway through the term). To tie all of the parts together, the students are asked to prepare a final design laboratory project describing how materials, manufacturing processes, and mechanical or electrical design changes to the basic product investigated in the Mechanical and Electrical Engineering laboratories would improve these toys. SME Competency Gaps: The SME Competency Gaps and Criteria for 2002 lists fourteen (14) gaps as identified by industry. Recognizing that the course herein described is a first year course, it would seem unreasonable to expect many of the gaps to be satisfied. Yet, the course addresses ten (10) of the fourteen specified gaps. Five of the criteria concern materials and their processing. Lecture and laboratory experience in material testing, welding, material removal, sheet metal forming, foundry and polymers provide an excellent foundation to satisfy these criteria. Students operate the equipment in each laboratory to become acquainted with the processes. This is extremely important for these students as they will work for a cooperative work employer who will probably start them working in a production environment. Five criteria concern working in an industrial environment and the skills needed to institute, develop and present the solution to a problem. These are addressed in each laboratory exercise, whether manufacturing, mechanical design or electrical design. Each of these ten competencies will be highlighted throughout the remainder of the paper. The remaining four criteria are related to the operation of an enterprise and are not covered in this class but are treated in subsequent classes. Manufacturing Processes Lecture and Laboratory: Using the laboratories identified above, the lecture and laboratory were coordinated to provide students both the theory and practice of “smoke-stack” industry manufacturing. This portion of P ge 703.2 “Proceedings of the 2002 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2002, American Society for Engineering Education the class addresses the five materials and processing criteria address by SME. Topically, these included the following subjects with the associated laboratory practice also noted. Metallic materials: Metallic materials are discussed beginning with the unit cell structures, and then proceeding to mechanical properties, changes in properties and structure through the application of heat, and production of the metallic shapes. Laboratory experience includes the analysis of tensile testing and hardness testing. These topics are treated more extensively in later materials courses. Foundry practice: The basic foundry methods are discussed including sand casting, investment casting, and permanent mold casting, both gravity and die casting. Two laboratories reinforce these topics as the students first ram up and pour a green sand casting in the form of square blocks from a match plate (Figure 1), and then fabricate their own design in expanded polystyrene patterns and pour lost foam castings (Figure 2). All castings are in aluminum. An advanced course in foundry practice is offered for upperclass students as an elective. Figure 1. Blocks cast by Figure 2. Example of green sand process. lost foam casting. Material removal: Since castings require machining, this topic follows casting. Basic lathe operations are discussed as are horizontal milling, broaching and drilling. These operations are combined with the block in Figure 1 and a round bar into a project called a “pencil holder” that the students take home (Figure 3) as a reminder of the work in the material removal lab. This project is done in teams of two. Advanced courses in material removal and NC machining are available as options for upper level students. Bulk deformation: This category includes the topics of flat rolling, shape rolling, forging and extrusion and are covered as lecture topics Figure 3. Pencil holder only assembly. Surface deformation: The topics of shearing, bending, drawing and stretching are covered showing the many ways that sheet metal can be formed. In the laboratory, disks are blanked and then formed into cups (Figure 4) to demonstrate the formability of sheet steel. Circle grid P ge 703.3 “Proceedings of the 2002 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2002, American Society for Engineering Education markings demonstrate the flow of the material during drawing. An advanced optional course in sheet metal forming is available to investigate further details of the forming processes. Powdered Metals: This topic is covered in lecture but time does not permit the use of existing laboratory facilities to make small powdered metal parts. Joining Processes: The processes of welding, brazing, soldering and bonding are covered in lecture. The intent is to familiarize the students with the many different processes available for joining materials. A laboratory experience allows the students to practice oxyacetylene welding and brazing. A second experience introduces them to shielded metal arc welding. An upperclass elective in joining processes is offered for those who wish to go further. Figure 4. Gridded cup Polymers and their processes: The last topic covered is polymers and their manufacturing processes. The basic structure of polymers and the methods used to turn resin or preformed shapes into useful product are discussed. A laboratory experience permits the students to vacuum-form a 12” x 12” sheet (Figure 5) as well as injection mold a system producing three different parts. An advanced course in polymer processing extends this basic knowledge and adds mold design and rapid prototyping. Relationship of Manufacturing Lecture and Laboratory to SME Criteria: The above described lecture and laboratory experiences directly attack the five criteria concerning specific manufacturing processes, manufacturing process control, manufacturing systems, materials Figure 5. Vacuumand their properties, and production and process design. Students formed shape. completing this course are well prepared to enter the industrial community with a foundation to build upon. Since over 80% of our students have a work experience associated with production, the employers are hiring a student with a sense of m