Paper Authors

Abstract

NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract

Main Menu

Session 2563

Combining Design and Manufacturing Into a First Year Course

William J. Riffe*, Laura Rust**, Douglas Melton**, Brenda Lemke***, Jacqueline El-Sayed*** *Manufacturing Engineering/**Electrical and Computer Engineering ***Mechanical Engineering Kettering University Flint, MI 48504-4898

Abstract:

For several decades, Kettering University has taught an introductory course for first year engineering students to acquaint them with the manufacturing processes that they might encounter as part of their cooperative work experience. The revision of the curriculum in 2001 caused a redesign of the course and added some design experiences to further enhance the educational process. This paper discusses the development of the new course called Interdisciplinary Design and Manufacturing and discusses relationship of course coverage to the SME competency gaps. The manufacturing portion describes the lecture topics and laboratory experiments that were an integral part of the course. The mechanical and electrical design portions describe the use of commercial toys and a self-designed toy platform that formed the basis of the new design laboratory portion of the class. It will be demonstrated that it is possible to make a meaningful first year experience for all engineering students combining mechanical and electrical design with manufacturing theory and laboratory.

Development of a Philosophy:

Kettering University is a cooperative education university where students begin their cooperative work experience at the beginning of their first year and alternate school and work in three-month increments throughout their five-year academic experience. This close-coupled relationship of work and school requires the students to become knowledgeable in manufacturing processes as most of the work experiences begin with assignments in the manufacturing operations of their industrial environment. During the curriculum reform, it was decided to add a design component to the course.

When first conceived, it was believed that the design and manufacturing portions of the course could be close-coupled such that the extensive manufacturing laboratory facilities available at Kettering University could be used to create prototypes of the design projects. Weekly meetings with an interdisciplinary team of faculty developed interesting projects but topics that would not lend themselves to the close-coupling philosophy. The major obstacle was that the manufacturing facilities would be used in a non-traditional manner and would not allow the students to see the proper utilization of the equipment. An example of this would be using a

“Proceedings of the 2002 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2002, American Society for Engineering Education

Main Menu

• Citation

• Format
  • APA
  • APA - LaTeX bibitem
  • MLA
  • MLA - LaTeX bibitem
  • Bibtex
  • EndNote - RIS

Riffe, W., & Rust, L., & Lemke, B. (2002, June), Combining Design And Manufacturing Into A First Year Course Paper presented at 2002 Annual Conference, Montreal, Canada. 10.18260/1-2--10653