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The Metal Hour: We Don't Just Play Heavy Metal Music-- We Also Talk About Metallurgy Abstract

A weekly radio program is broadcast from a campus studio with the purposes of providing materials engineering instruction and entertainment to the local community. Faculty and students that organize and create each weekly show are students and fans of both materials topics and music. The format of the show includes music that ranges up to the extreme metal genre. Discussions are held between blocks of songs, and include a variety of topics. Past discussion topics include the environment, manufacturing, atomic level processes in materials and extraterrestial visitors. A project exercise in a Materials Engineering course allows students to create a music CD that incorporates a discussion of a materials related topic. Learning evaluation criteria are being developed.

Background

The Metal Hour concept was originated in 2000 at Washington State University-Vancouver. The campus radio station, CougarRF was new and under development. Several Metal Hour broadcast attempts were made during 2000 and 2001, but were never aired due to lack of a transmitter.

The Metal Hour restarted in September 2005 at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. The show is broadcast once a week during a regular time slot and can be heard on the radio at FM 90.7 in the Terre Haute listening area. The show can also be heard on the internet at www.wmhdradio.org. The radio station at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, FM 90.7 'The Monkey', has a wide and regular audience, and strong campus support.

The objective of the Metal Hour is to develop interest in Metallurgy and Materials. The show includes materials-related topics in a musical entertainment format, and exposes large numbers of radio and internet listeners to different aspects of materials. The show is also a good vehicle for introducing different materials topics to engineering students in an entertaining manner.

Format and Features

The format of the Metal Hour is music, followed by discussions about materials-related topics. There is generally no link between the music that is played and the discussions that follow. The first fifteen minutes of a given show are spent playing two or three tracks from recognizable bands. After the last track in the initial set, a short discussion about a featured topic is presented. Typical featured topics include strengthening of metals, welding, failure, aircraft, the environment, etc. The initial discussion lasts approximately five minutes, and serves as a general introduction. The featured topic will be discussed approximately two more times during a given show.

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Ferro, P. (2006, June), The Metal Hour: We Don't Just Play Heavy Metal Music We Also Talk About Metallurgy Paper presented at 2006 Annual Conference & Exposition, Chicago, Illinois. 10.18260/1-2--1461