The Dancing Marionette An Interdisciplinary Capstone Design Experience For Engineering Technology And Computer Science Students

With the advances in microelectronics devices, often computers, sensors, and actuators are integrated into mechanical systems. Modern engineering design thus requires efforts from a multidisciplinary team. Traditional capstone design projects offer few opportunities for interdepartmental collaborations. This paper presents an experimental capstone project organized to allow computer science students and manufacturing and mechanical engineering technology (MMET) students to work together on a “dancing marionette”. The project involved three major components: 1) mechanical/kinematics design, 2) computer motion control, and 3) manufacturing. The MMET students took on the tasks of the mechanical design and fabrication of an electro-mechanical movement system. The computer science students developed motion control hardware and software to prescribe life-like movements of the puppet. While the highly successful prototype demonstrated the value of interdisciplinary collaboration, feedback from faculty and students also suggested that better communication can further improve the learning experience of future students.