BACHELOR OF SCIENCE IN MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
Senior Year in Mechanical Engineering
It's been a long road, but seniors enter their last year having learned an amazing amount of material. Mathematics and physics have become tools they use without hesitation. Topics students discuss have moved beyond course work to areas of applications.
Finding Your Area of Interest and Expertise
Some students have drifted toward robotics while others have drifted toward thermodynamics, controls, propulsion, or machine design. Every student has found an area or multiple areas that they associate with deeper knowledge. But the senior year is not for the faint of heart. The challenge that students are confronted with is two fold. The first is completing that quest for discipline specific depth. The second focuses all their energy and skill set toward design.
Capstone Design Experience
The
most significant part of the senior year is the capstone experience.
In the capstone experience Mehanical Engineering students have the opportunity
to collaborate with Aerospace Engineering or Electrical Engineering
teams in designing aircraft, spacecraft, robots, or
aircraft engines. This integration of Mechanical Engineering with Aerospace
and Electrical Engineers is unusual within academics. Yet every team
we've ever seen in the aerospace industry involves, EE's, AE's, and ME's,
so we believe this experience prepares our students for industry and
multidisciplinary projects within graduate school.
In the first course of the capstone experience, students design entire aircraft, spacecraft, robots, or a propulsion system looking at performance and cost. In the second course in the series they choose a portion of the design, to design in detail, fabricate, and then test.
Engineers from industry come to campus to hear formal briefings much like preliminary design reviews and critical design reviews in industry. Faculty and industry judge these designs to establish how well they have met design requirements, the creativity of their solution space, and the technical rigor that they have used to ensure the functionality, utility, manufacturability, and performance of the design.
Teamwork
The senior year is the time to use the tool set developed over the previous three years and integrate the complexities of structure, propulsion, and control. Typical teams include a propulsion team, structures team, instrument team, controls, and integration team. Students use technical skills from previous classes, learn management methods, and work with students in a fast paced year. Our goal is to mimic industry in this respect. Industry doesn't design an aircraft with one or two people and nor do our students. Teams are essential, as are document protocols, drawing release schedules, critical scheduling paths, finite element simulation, CAD drawings, prototypes, instrumentation plans, and integration strategies. The Capstone experience enables students to put themselves in challenging situations and succeed.
Courses for the Senior year are listed below:
Senior Year
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| EC225 | Engineering Economics | 3 |
| ES403 | Heat Transfer | 3 |
| HU330 | Values and Ethics | 3 |
| ME400 | Vibration and Acoustics | 3 |
| ME403 | Thermal Power Systems | 3 |
| ME406 or ME4x1 | Robotics II or Advanced Propulsion | 3 |
| Tech Elective | Robotics III, Propulsion III, Structures II, Aero I, Space Mech. S&I, Space Propulsion or Course Approved by Advisor | 2 |
| MA412 | Probability and Statistics | 3 |
| Prelim.* | AE420, AE427, AE435 OR EE420 | 4/3 |
| Detail* | AE421, AE445, AE440, OR EE421 | 4/3 |
| EE Course** | Course approved for advisor for students taking EE capstone series | 3 |
| Total | 31 |
* ME students have four possible sequences for their capstone sequence, they include:
Astro: Students taking the Space capstone sequence are required
to take:
AE427, Spacecraft Preliminary Design 4 credits
AE 445, Spacecraft Detail Design, 4 credits
Aero: Students taking the Aircraft capstone sequence are required
to take:
AE420, Aircraft Preliminary Design, 4 credits
AE 421 Aircraft Detail Design, 4 credits
Propulsion: Students taking the Propulsion capstone sequence are
required to take:
AE435, Air-Breathing Propulsion Preliminary Design, 4 credits
AE440, Air-Breathing Propulsion Detail Design, 4 credits
Robotics: Students wishing to take a Robotics Capstone sequence
need to coordinate activities with the Electrical Engineering Department. In
this sequence students take:
EE420 Preliminary Design I, 3 credits
EE421, Senior Capstone Project, 3 credits
**In addition students choosing the Robotics sequence will take one addition
CEC or EE 2 or 3 credit course as determined by the student and the EE
chair
