Mechanical and Materials Engineering DepartmentPortland State University

ME 491/492/493 Capstone Design ExperienceInformation for Juniors

Overview

The objective of the capstone design courses is to prepare you for a design career. Real design problems are different than textbook analysis problems in that real design problems have many clients and a multitude of often conflicting requirements and compromised solutions. In real design problems there is a shortage of time and other resources as well constraints on manufacturing facilities, materials, and off-the-shelf components. Time and resource management is the key to succeed in a design project. Product design in industry is almost always done by multi-disciplinary teams composed of mechanical designers, manufacturing experts, management, and marketing personnel to name a few. Depending on the project, the team may have people from additional disciplines such as electrical engineering, computer science, materials science, or other specialties.

In the capstone course sequence you learn about the design process, identifying and interviewing customers, developing the product design specifications, developing engineering specifications, performing benchmarking and setting performance targets, performing parametric analysis, developing house of quality, performing external and internal search for solutions, and making decisions about best options. Another important element of being a good designer is to know the teamwork processes and project management techniques. You will learn about team dynamics, conflict resolution, team decision-making methods, how to conduct formal team

meetings and keep team records, and how to divide tasks efficiently. Capstone projects must have sponsors or affiliates outside of the university. You learn to interact with clients, make presentations in class and to clients, and learn to write design reports. Finally, you are required to make physical prototypes of the devices you design and test them to verify that design requirements are met. For more information about these topics, you may refer to the following web site: http://web.cecs.pdx.edu/~far/

Capstone Projects

Specific capstone projects are offered to you by the MME Department during the Fall term. You do not have to find your own capstone projects. Capstone projects must have industrial sponsors or be a part of an organized professional society design competition. For the last few years we have had the ASME Human Powered Competition and the SAE Formula-1 competition. In the past, we have also had SAE Mini Baja competition, and SAE RC Airplane competition. If you are interested in any of these projects, please contact ASME or SAE teams or ask for the faculty advisors for these student clubs. Industrial projects are presented in class by industry representatives. If you are currently working in a company and would like to propose a project, contact the capstone design coordinator and provide industry contact information about your project. We also have joint projects with the electrical and computer engineering or computer science departments in which a team of mechanical and electrical engineers work on an interdisciplinary project. In rare occasions we allow teams to propose their own projects provided the project meets the academic requirements. In such cases, the team must identify a practicing engineer outside the university to be the team industrial mentor. The team must also show the financial resources necessary to build and test their prototype.

Surgical Robot – Sponsored by OHSU

Industrial Water Treatment – Sponsored by Intel

Two Phase Flow – Sponsored by NASA

Volcanic Lake ROV – Sponsored by PSU Biology Dept

Capstone Calendar

The capstone experience is made up of three classes: ME 491 in Fall term, ME 492 in Winter term, and ME 493 in Spring term. Generally, capstone teams and projects are selected during the Fall term. In the Winter term the teams engineer their solution concepts into detailed production specifications. In the Spring term, teams work on prototyping and performance verification of their designs. A more detailed description of activities during each class is presented next.

Elephant Enrichment Project – Sponsored by Oregon Zoo

What Happens in ME 491

During the Fall term in ME 491, you learn about the design process, teamwork, project management, and other skills you need to organize and manage the technical engineering work on your project. Capstone projects are proposed and by the middle of November all the teams have formed, selected their projects, have had their introductory meeting with their sponsors, and have developed a one-page project proposal explaining the scope of their projects. The proposals are then reviewed by a team of MME faculty advisors and are either approved or returned to the teams for modifications. Although the official start of your project work and faculty advisor assignments are made during the Winter term, you can start working on your projects and perform background research during the Fall term if you link. In fact, large-scale competition-based projects must have their own project management calendars due to the complexity of their constructions.

ME 491 also has a mini design competition requirement. For this competition, you form teams and design and build a simple, usually battery powered device to do a task. In 2009 we had a pole climber device and the year before that, the devices transferred water from one container to another using solar power.

ME 491 Mini Project Competitions (from top left): Solar Water Pump, Solar Water Pump, Solar Water Pump, Pole Climber, Rope Climber, Egg Launcher.

What Happens in ME 492

Your capstone projects officially start in the beginning of the Winter term. In this class you will put the things you learned in ME 491 to work to create the best solution concept. Your first deliverable in this class is the Product Design Specifications (PDS) Report which is due at the end of January. Teams have hour-long formal meetings with their advisors every week. Each team and each individual in class is required to make a presentation on various aspects of the design process. There are three phases and three sets of presentations. The first one is the PDS presentation followed by Internal/External search presentation, and the last one is a Concept Selection and Progress presentation. A Progress Report is due at the end of this term. Learn to write well because a good portion of your grade depends on the quality of your writing in these reports.

What Happens in ME 493

The design process continues during the Spring term with an emphasis on detail design including various analyses, simulations, and other methods necessary to embody the design concept. For a good part of this term you will be involved with prototyping and testing activities. These activities include ordering parts, making some parts here at PSU, and possibly developing specifications for other parts to be made elsewhere. Note that building parts is not required by this class – in many cases your sponsor may do all the manufacturing. You need to provide construction plans and make sure the parts and assemblies are made based on your instructions. Most of the teams, however, do a lot of their prototyping in the MME machine shop to gain more experience with production machines. Sponsors often provide manufacturing services if you plan ahead of time and give them plenty of lead time. A final design report is due at the end of the Spring term.

The end of the Spring term, usually during first week of June, is the time for show and tell. Final capstone presentations are attended by a wide range of audiences including your sponsors, the faculty, your friends and family, lower grade students, the MME Industrial Advisory Board, and other professionals. In addition to final presentation, you are required to display your prototypes in the atrium of the Engineering Building and create poster presentations. A number of assessment activities take place during the capstone experience as a part of our engineering accreditation. Two of the important standard tests you will be doing in ME493 are an FE-type (Fundamentals of Engineering) test and a PE-type (Professional Engineering) test. The FE-type test is about basic mathematics, physics, chemistry, materials, statics, dynamics, and electrical circuits. The PE-type exam is about your Junior-level classes including strength of materials, thermodynamics, heat transfer, machine components, vibrations, and fluid mechanics. Prepare for these exams by reviewing these subjects – they influence you grade in ME 493.

Inkjet Printer Microscope – Sponsored by Xerox Solar Energy Demonstration Kit

Two-Phase Flow – Sponsored by NASA Mira’s Ramp – Sponsored by Oregon Zoo

The capstone experience is like your first engineering job. You can learn a lot about the entire design process from identifying what the customer wants to verifying that your design met the customer specifications. Along the way you also learn about team-working, project management, and effective communication. We encourage all of our students to learn more about the MME capstone design process prior to their senior year so they are better prepared for their capstone experience. We also invite all of our students to attend part of or all of the final capstone project presentations, prototype displays, and poster sessions at the end of the Spring Term. Look out for final presentation announcements in late May.