Me250 was not the class I thought it would be, I expected the project to be similar to the previous semesters project but it wasn’t, it was better. It’s hard to imagine how much I have learned from this, at first the project seemed extremely abstract and I had no idea how we were going to reach our final goal. The lectures and assignments helped to guide us through the whole process while teaching us various manufacturing skills, for example: how to use the lathe, band saw, mill, laser cutter and the water jet, which proved to be very useful while manufacturing parts. Building a working machine from what were simply materials a couple of weeks ago was an incredible experience.
The design process was this class was probably the most important. It taught us how to translate what a consumer wants/ is looking for in the final product into an actual design on solid works. Solid works was extremely easy, yet helpful software to use and design the machine. This class gave me a preview of how engineers actually design a product in the real world. I dint realize how difficult it was to design a product from scratch, it wasn’t hard to come up with a strategy, it wasn’t hard to come up with the functional requirement and it wasn’t hard to come up with the necessary module’s but what was hard was to put everything together. We as a team encountered various problems through our design process which made us alter our design more than 5 times throughout the time we had to design it.
Finally when it came to manufacturing we were somewhat ready to start building the machine. We had the skills necessary from all the training we took but we still did not have personal experience using the machines. At first it took us hours to figure out the machines but by the end of the semester these machines were very easy to use. Throughout the course of manufacturing we were faced by a couple of design problems, therefore we had to alter the design while building the machine. The final machine worked as expected but the module we built for it to complete its task was different than the module we originally designed.
Teamwork played an important role in designing and manufacturing the machine. It’s stunning how a group of people can collaborate and throw out a million ideas many of which were used in designing the machine. Without a team one would get stuck while designing because there wouldn’t be anyone else to back him/her up with their opinions on the design. I felt that teamwork was crucial during the manufacturing process, there were so many times when we encountered a major problem and one of us, somehow, had a solution to it. Working with a team helps as you can divide all the work required and conquer it in a smaller time frame.
Time management was the biggest issue; this class took up way too much time. For some reason no matter how much we planned ahead we always felt like there wasn’t enough time to finish. Various assignments took up unnecessary time like the bicycle assignment was kind of pointless. During the final weeks of this class I felt like I dint have enough time for my other classes, we spent about 25 hours in the lab manufacturing the machine to meet various deadlines. Although the deadlines were extremely helpful to keep us on track with the class, we should have had more time between two consecutive deadlines.
The class felt a bit disorganized, at times I felt like no one knew what was going on, for example the motor assignment took us a lot more time to finish then it was indented to. It took a whole extra lab and time outside the lab to finish it because we dint have all the materials necessary to complete the assignment. Initially at the start of the semester there were assignments due every single class, which I thought was too much work. The worst part was that some of them were not even counted for points but were worth negative points.
Overall the class felt like a mechanical engineering design class. It really added a lot to my knowledge about engineering. I felt like I was truly doing something related to my major, it made me experience the life of a mechanical engineer.
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