Engineering Quarterly VOL.I. . . No.3
SPRING 2019
W ELCOME ! By TERRY PILLING
The Engineering Quarterly is a newsletter published four times per year by the University of Mary School of Engineering. The intended audience are engineers, engineering students, alumni, future engineering students, and people working in closely related fields such as science, computing, or mathematics. In this Spring issue we include profiles of our first graduates from the University of Mary Engineering School as well as the recipients of the Student of the Year awards and the Engineering Scholarships that are awarded each academic year. As usual, we also include service and outreach events that our students have been involved in since our last issue back in November, as well as fun and interesting mathematical and technical problems from each of the majors for you to try if you are so inclined. Note that the Engineering School is moving to a temporary location in Bismarck for the entire 2019-2020 academic year while our new engineering building is being constructed on campus. As soon as final exams are finished we will start the demolition of the old building and the construction of the new one. The construction is anticipated to last more than a year and we plan to keep you up to date on the progress throughout Volume 2 of the Engineering Quarterly. We hope you enjoy this issue of EQ. If you have any suggestions, or if you have any news or events that would be of interest to engineers and engineering students, please don’t hesitate to contact me. Terry Pilling, PhD University of Mary Engineering
G RADUATION 2019 This spring we send our best wishes to the first graduating students from our Engineering School: Michael Gorder and Isaac Saad are graduating at the University of Mary Spring Commencement scheduled for Saturday, April 27, 2019 at 2:00pm CDT at the Bismarck Event Center. Michael and Isaac have taken engineering courses from both the University of Mary and the University of North Dakota as part of the combined degree program that we have set up, which enabled our students to take courses from both institutions to complete the degree requirements while we were still in the process of building our engineering program here.
Michael Gorder graduated this spring with a degree in Civil Engineering. Originally from Eagan, Minnesota, Michael came to the University of Mary for basketball and was a Business Michael Gorder Administration major until he switched to Civil Engineering the first year that we started our engineering program. Since then, Michael has been a three-time Academic All-American in the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference, made the University of Mary Honor Roll twice, and was named Male Scholar Athlete of the Year. “I have always been interested in engineering, mainly because my father is a civil engineer. He is the city engineer for the City of Eagan. I did not feel challenged by the Business Administration major and found it did not interest me much. So, when I heard we were getting a four-year program, I switched majors to civil engineering. I decided to switch because I have been around civil engineering my whole life and wanted to be challenged. Some goals I have achieved during my time here include playing college basketball while going through the rigorous grind of engineering school. Engineering school is tough enough by itself and when you add the countless hours on the basketball court, it adds up. During the past few summers I have also had two separate internships. The first internship was with Moore Engineering, in Bismarck and the second was with the City of Mandan Engineering Department. My overall time at the University of Mary was great. The sense of community and hospitality is unlike anything else I have seen. I had some amazing classmates, professors, teammates, and coaches during my time here. I am very fortunate to have gone to the University of Mary. My plans for the future are to start my new job this May, working for Moore Engineering here in Bismarck, as a Graduate Engineer and I can’t wait to get started.” Isaac Saad graduated this spring with a degree in Civil Engineering. Originally from Prior Lake, Minnesota, Isaac came to Bismarck to pursue a degree in Civil Engineering via our dual degree program with the University of MinIsaac Saad nesota. Isaac transferred into our Civil Engineering degree program in Fall of 2015. Isaac is a student athlete who pitches for the Marauders baseball team. After graduation he plans to do an internship this summer and take the FE exam and then plans to apply for jobs with civil engineering firms such as PCL and Mortensen. “I always loved math – I found it was easy for me, and
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better than subjects like history and English which require writing a lot of essays. My cousin is a civil engineer with Mortensen and I always knew I would either go into civil engineering or materials science. I loved my time here at the University of Mary. There has been a lot of all-nighters over the course of my degree since baseball took up just as much time as my classwork. I don’t regret anything and I had a lot of fun whether with my engineering buddies or my baseball buddies. I plan to drop in once in awhile and see how things are going whenever I am back in the area.” Isaac is currently designing the new baseball stadium for the Marauders baseball team. It is designed in AutoCAD with indoor bleachers, offices, bullpens, dugouts, meeting rooms, pitching and batting cages, locker rooms, and overhead lights to practice and play games at night. Isaac plans to continue playing baseball along with his engineering career and he even has plans to try out for professional double-A and triple-A teams in the minor leagues.
E NGINEERING S TUDENT OF THE Y EAR AWARDS Every year the faculty of the Engineering School selects one student from each of the engineering majors to receive the Student of the Year award for that major. The selection criteria are academic excellence, leadership, and excellence of character. We are pleased to announce the following winners of this year’s awards. Aaron Bales is the winner of the Electrical Engineering Student of the Year Award. Aaron is a junior electrical engineering student, originally from Bismarck, ND, who not only conAaron Bales sistently achieves the highest level of academic excellence, but also has character traits of a leader, such as organizing skills, positive attitude, and the ability to motivate others to complete group tasks on schedule. We expect great things are in store for Aaron. “I’ve always been interested in working with electronics; after I switched my major from nursing I thought it would be something I would enjoy. I haven’t decided exactly which path of electrical engineering I’d like to take. I’m leaning towards power systems, but I’ll have to see what options are available to me.” Peter Collart is a sophomore Mechanical Engineering student with a strong personal drive for academic excellence and service to others. Peter Peter Collart is a hard worker with
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the organizational skills and ability to inspire others and get group projects completed. We expect to see Peter accomplishing amazing things and rising to a leadership role in his future career. “I am originally from a suburb of Atlanta called Covington, GA. I have eight siblings, one of whom is a nuclear engineer working in Birmingham, AL. I chose mechanical engineering out of a love for mechanical systems and machines. I also really liked the thought of being a part of some of the engineering marvels coming out today. I think I will really enjoy working in the engineering field. After graduation I plan on taking the FE exam, getting a job, and raising a family.” Caleb Weisgarber is a junior Civil Engineering student originally from Washburn, ND, who not only works tirelessly to accomplish his academic goals, but also takes on leadership responsibilities as a defensive Caleb Weisgarber back on the Marauders football team as well as the president of the Engineering Students Club – an organization which he helped to initiate. Caleb is sure to become a successful engineer and leader in his future career. “I chose civil engineering because I have always had a drive for mathematics and science, and when civil engineering was introduced to me in high school, I knew that it was the career for me. After graduation I plan to stay in the Bismarck area and look for a position at an engineering firm, more specifically, in the transportation area of civil engineering.” Jacob Lantz is a Construction Management student who consistently pushes himself to success in both academics and team projects. He consistently shows his skill at organizing resources Jacob Lantz and work schedules to get the job done. We expect to see Jacob at the helm of many awesome projects in his future career as a construction manager. “I am originally from Dickinson, ND. I chose construction management because I wanted to spend more time in the field than an engineer would. CM seemed more hands-on and more people-oriented than civil engineering, which was my original major. I plan to get a job in the field, hopefully in North Dakota or in the surrounding states.”
S CHOLARSHIPS Scholarships are important to students for a variety of reasons. They help students financially by reducing the number of student loans they need to take out; they are valuable additions to the student’s resume when they start applying for engineering positions and are often more meaningful than grades in determining the abilities and character of an applicant; and they are an added incentive for achieving the highest level of academic excellence 1
Engineering Quarterly SPRING 2019 and excellence of character and service. The sponsoring person or company is mentioned and praised every year when the scholarship is granted, not only in the Engineering Quarterly, but also on the University of Mary website, other University of Mary publications, and in the ceremony when the scholarship is granted to the student. Scholarships can be of any amount and they can have a variety of conditions for determining who is selected each year. They can be set up as one time awards or they can be offered every year. You could even endow a scholarship which would continue to fund itself in perpetuity1 . Please note that the University of Mary is a nonprofit university and all donations are therefore taxdeductible. G REAT R IVER E NERGY S CHOLARSHIPS
Great River Energy has sponsored two Scholarships for students enrolled in the University of Mary’s engineering program. The scholarships are awarded to promising students who are beginning their junior or senior year and who plan to enter the energy industry. The winners this year are Josef Sollmann and Gabriel Zimmer. “Great River Energy appreciates the University of Mary’s efforts at training a workforce that will help our company succeed in the future, and so, through its Coal Creek Station and Spiritwood Station, is pleased to contribute $2,500 for the 2019/2020 school year to two worthy candidates in programs that will help our industry in the coming years.” Josef is a junior in electrical engineering who grew up in Port Angeles, WA. “I always loved figuring out how something works, and I knew I wanted to do something that allowed me Josef Sollmann be a part of that processes behind the scenes and possibly improve on them. Electrical engineering is what I think best allows me to contribute in an important way to society, and help innovate and refine processes and components that we use in our technologies. Energy and power have fascinated me since high school, and now in college as I learn more, I continue to be intrigued by it. Over this summer I hope to intern with a power company to get a better idea of what working in this field looks like. After I graduate, I intend to pursue a career in this field, either in distribution or manufacturing. One of the biggest aspects of the power and energy field that attracts me is how incredibly needed it is. Nothing would be able to function in our country without the engineers and workers in this field. I want to be a benefit to society by
Note that a minimum of $25,000 is required to set up an endowment for a permanent scholarship.
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being a part of this field and helping to refine and innovate the industry by assisting in the process of making energy distribution affordable, plentiful, practical, and environmentally responsible.” Gabriel is a sophomore electrical engineering student originally from West Bend, WI. “Great River, in particular, caught my attention at the recent engineering gala because of its nonprofit Gabriel Zimmer nature, and led to me giving more serious thought to the field. After all, electricity is essential for so much of life today, and the idea of being able to supply people with something that is so necessary to modern life as we know it is very appealing to me. I also feel I would enjoy working with the arrangement of circuits as well, as I find working on and solving such problems very satisfying. I am currently taking classes dealing with recording, modeling, analyzing, and performing computations on sets of data and I have also taken a number of classes on the assembly and analysis of linear circuits and operational amplifiers. I am looking for internships and co-ops to help get more experience in the field, develop my skills, and have a clearer idea of what sort of potential positions and tasks I have to look forward to.” NDSPE S CHOLARSHIPS
The North Dakota Society of Professional Engineers, Chapter 3, had their annual Banquet on Thursday evening, February 21, at the Bismarck Municipal Country Club. The NDSPE Chapter 3 donated $500 to the University of Mary Engineering School and they awarded two $500 scholarships to our engineering students. The recipients this year were Snædı́s Danı́elsdóttir and Joshua Reiner. Snædı́s is a sophomore electrical engineering student who was born and raised in the Westfjords of Iceland. She has volunteered with many organizations such as Special Olympics, Dreams of Motion, Day of Service, Search and Res- Snædı́s Danı́elsdóttir cue and she has completed a summer internship with Verkis Consulting Engineers in Reykjavik, Iceland. She is a certified electrician and she won the 2018 Teammate of the Year award as the goalkeeper on the University of Mary women’s soccer team. “I am the youngest of five and my close family is quite big; I have 11 nieces and nephews. I spent most of my childhood at my father’s farm/ranch (he has cows and sheep) or on a soccer field. No one knows what the future may hold, but nothing is perfect and so
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many things are in constant need of upgrading or fixing. Engineers have the power and knowledge to make life easier for the people - whether it is to travel, communicate or simply stay warm. We are constantly growing in technology and as engineers, and I want to be a part of that.” Josh is a sophomore electrical engineering student originally from Bismarck. Josh has engaged in many outreach and service activJoshua Reiner ities such as the Youth Correctional Center, Heavens Helpers Soup Cafe, and Ministry on the Margins. In his spare time Josh enjoys his other passion, cameras. He is a photographer, cinematographer, and graphical designer and has already completed projects and invented electronics devices for use in the area of photography. “Since my first semester of college I have continued to strive for excellence and understanding in all of my courses. I love being pushed to my limits, because it causes me to grow as a person, certainly preparing me for what it will be like to be out in the field as an engineer. I pursue this degree because I want to continue to learn after graduation and not become mediocre in my knowledge and understanding of the world. I want to strive for excellence and fullness, not for my own good, but for others.”
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Students from Engineering, Biology, and Chemistry displayed and discussed their stuCivil engineering students showed off dent projects from the spring semester with other students, faculty, engineering company their ECI451 Steel Design projects using representatives, and other interested people Revit to design structures according to various strength and load conditions. They also from Bismarck and the surrounding area. showed off the truss bridges that they constructed in one of their courses last semester.
Design projects are a huge part of the education of engineering students at the University of Mary. We believe that getting your D ISCOVER E NGINEERING hands dirty and building things is an imporBy ANTHONY WALDENMAIER tant part of the education of an engineer. We also like to choose projects that span different sub-disciplines of engineering and also span The North Dakota Society of Professional different courses. Engineers (NDSPE) hosted a “Discover Engineering” Day at the Kirkwood Mall on Saturday, Feb 16, to introduce children to engineering-related topics and activities. The event featured 12 area companies with a variety of scientific and engineering demonstrations including static electricity, tension and compression, electrical circuits, foundations, and structure. Over 500 children attended the event. The University of Mary booth featured seven different activities and demonstrations: E LECTRICAL E NGINEERING S CHOLARSHIP Electricity Generation - students can power a light bulb by turning a crank. This is a simple version of a manual generator which The winner of this year’s $1000 electrical serves as the basic premise of many forms of engineering scholarship is John Santiago. Our Mechanical and Electrical engineer- electricity production in the modern world. John is a junior ing students completed a project that com- Brush Bots - originally made for EEL 304 electrical engineerbined their work from three different courses: Computer Aided Measurements and Coning student, originally EEL421 Electronics II, EME323 Machine trols, these miniature robots scuttle around from a small town Component Design, and EEL405 Control with the use of an offset weight cellphone in New York called Systems. Students built an inverted pendu- vibrator motor powered by a watch battery. Port Chester but then lum using PID controllers they built in their The body of the bot is made from the head moving to Connecticut electronics lab, motors and chassis designed of a toothbrush, with the bristles acting as the when he started grade and constructed in their machine component bot’s legs. Students originally built these bots school. John became John Santiago design lab, and the theory and tuning of the to demonstrate and mathematically model the interested in electrical concept of swarming the same way a large engineering when, in his freshman year of PID controllers was done in their control sysflock of birds or school of fish can uniformly high school, he had a retired electrical en- tems lab. change direction. gineer from the U.S. Navy teach his physics class. “I looked to him as sort of a mentor, and ever since then, I aspired to go down a similar career path.” John is inclined to a career in microelectronics, programming, or power systems. John has shown a deep understanding of the numerous complicated engineering and mathematics subjects he has taken in his degree up to now and his work is of a quality and precision that stands at the highest level. We expect to see John continue to accomplish great things in his future career path. The electrical engineering student project from their EEL304 Computer Aided Analysis course involved writing software in C++ and S CIENCE AND E NGINEERING OpenGL to model various physical systems Suspension Bridge Designed, 3D-printed, including a Snooker table, swarms of bees, and assembled by students from ENR 203 S PRING P OSTER S ESSION chaotic systems, one-dimensional cellular au- Mechanics of Materials. These bridges were tomatons, and Conway’s Game of Life. Their designed to have a certain amount of deflecOn Monday, April 15, we held our second display was set up so that people passing by tion under a predetermined load, placed on the annual Science and Engineering Poster Ses- could try out the various programs while the center span of the bridge. Students attending sion in Chick’s Place next to the Lumen Vitae students explained how it works and why it is the Discover Engineering day learned about Center on campus. interesting from an engineering perspective. the concepts of deflection and how a suspen-
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sion bridge (like the Golden Gate Bridge) works to distribute loads. Circuit Board Assembly - a basis for Electrical engineering, participants worked with faculty to build a simple circuit board using an LED, a push button, wires, and a bread board. When completed by the participants, the LED would light up when the button was pushed. Linkages - the concept of linkages was presented to participants to demonstrate how different arm ratios can change the manner in which a machine can move or rotate. The basic theory of linkages was used in the ME 322 Design of Machinery course to develop a crawling robotic assembly that mimics the way some insects crawl. Rolling Uphill Experiment this demonstration features a double cone on an inclined track, which will seemingly roll up the incline. Participants were baffled at the concept at first. However, after a brief explanation of the dynamics of the double cone on the Vshaped incline, students were surprised to see The engineering-related companies who that the object does, in fact, follow the laws of attended were gravity. • Bartlett & West • City of Bismarck
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tween floors someone asked you the question, “What do you do?” even if your response was “I’m a student,” you have delivered an elevator speech. The elevator speech is really important to a job search and should be developed, practiced and perfected, but not to the point of seeming rehearsed or canned. It should be second nature. Conversational yet concise is best but, most importantly, short. Less than 30 seconds is all it takes. Not rushed, just short. Think of it as an advertisement that draws in the listener by getting their attention and wanting to hear more. Communicate the value you could provide in a sentence or two and then try to open up the conversation. In the simplest sense, it may be just to communicate your availability and tell your story. Here are a few tips to help in creating yours: 1. Set the stage by introducing yourself. What is your career interest? Be a little creative and think about it from the listener’s perspective. What might the audience want to hear about? Employers most likely want to hear about motivated people with relevant talents that can help them.
• Killdeer Mountain Manufacturing • MDU Resources • Menards • Mountain Plains LLC • Military • ND Dept of Transportation Career fairs entail different goals for students depending on where you are in your degree path.
Gear Box - a 3D-printed gearbox with a handle for students to crank. With the shaft positioned in different locations and certain gear locks engaged, the output wheel of the gearbox will rotate at different speeds and directions. This is modeled on the same premise as an automatic gear box on a car.
C AREER FAIRS AND E LEVATOR S PEECHES By KEVIN ALLAN
The University of Mary department of Career Services held a career fair on Tuesday, February 26, from 12 pm to 3 pm in Chick’s Place on campus. The career and internship fair is for employers searching for both interns as well as full-time employees. Overall, we had 31 employers who attended the fair, up slightly from previous years. Eight employers were interested in visiting with our engineering students. Approximately 150 students of varying majors attended the event and the initial reactions from employers were positive in terms of setup, student volume and level of preparedness.
Career fairs are a place to gather information about different industries and various job opportunities that will be relevant in the future; you can gain information about possible employers and begin to network with various recruiters. Companies can tell you a little bit about themselves and explain how the process works within the organization to get hired. They can also inform you of any internships or scholarships they have which you may be eligible for. One of the tips we have for students searching for jobs is to develop an Elevator Speech.
2. What is your key message? What special strength do you offer? How are you different? Tell your special story in a few words to set yourself apart and communicate your value. Give quantifiable information if possible, such as, “achieved a double major and graduated cum laude.” Facts make an impact. 3. Use emotion and avoid the yawn by making it energetic or even passionate. What makes you excited about your career? Action words can be helpful but use jargon or terminology sparingly if at all. Smiling when you speak can work wonders at helping to continue the conversation. Practice makes perfect. 4. Talk about how you could benefit an employer. If you are in marketing, you may benefit an employer by helping to develop and sell innovative services. Culinary arts? Deliver delicious dishes that keep customers coming back. Teaching? How about you positively impacting students and preparing them for academic success. The benefit statement is persuasive and powerful when well crafted. 5. Use a hook to make it memorable and extend the relationship. Good advice is to “Stroke the corporate ego” or in some way compliment the employer or interviewer. Genuine compliments are always well received as long as they are factual and not pandering. Handing out a business card or resume works wonders too. Try to exchange email addresses, phone numbers, links or offer up your social media profile if appropriate.
Keep the door open. Be prepared to explain, support or defend any part of your elevator If you’ve ever been on an elevator and be- speech. kallan@umary.edu
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C ONTROLS TO BALANCE AN I NVERTED P ENDULUM
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electrical components of their system to gen- the driver. Use the data and the control chart erate a mathematical model. From the model, given. By ANTHONY GARCIA students could perform simulations, while using root locus and frequency response design Driver Rides Poor Ratings PR/Ride 1 275 36 0.1309 techniques to determine the appropriate conStudents in EEL 405: Control Systems, trol gain parameter values to achieve the de2 290 23 0.0793 EME 323: Machine Component Design, and sired outcome of balancing the inverted pen3 269 28 0.1041 EEL 421: Electronics II made a collaborative dulum. 4 301 19 0.0631 effort to tackle the classic controls problem of 5 251 26 0.1036 balancing an inverted pendulum. While this 6 234 14 0.0598 may appear to be an arbitrary problem, the 7 306 30 0.0980 type of feedback controller that the students 8 290 46 0.1586 implemented is ubiquitous in industrial auto9 288 17 0.0590 mated systems, vehicle cruise control, HVAC 10 264 24 0.0909 systems, and even aircraft control. 11 296 17 0.0574 The inverted pen12 259 25 0.0965 dulum is a nonlinear 13 320 27 0.0844 and inherently unsta14 314 42 0.1338 At the end of the semester, each group was ble system, shown in able to determine an approbate set of con15 275 35 0.1273 the figure above. The troller gains to achieve upright stability on 16 287 29 0.1010 rod attached to a cart at their built systems. Students had the oppor17 262 30 0.1145 a pivot point is stable tunity to demonstrate their work at the annual 18 298 23 0.0772 at two points: 1. when Poster Day to their peers and other members 19 256 2 0.0078 the pendulum is down (when θ = 180o in of the UMary community. 20 317 15 0.0473 figure above) and 2. when the pendulum is 21 312 27 0.0865 up (when θ = 0o exactly in figure above). 22 272 41 0.1507 However in both cases, if any disturbances 23 280 50 0.1786 were introduced to the system, the pendulum 24 266 23 0.0865 F UN S TUFF would fall to the downward stable position. 25 296 28 0.0946 The goal of the this controls problem is to 26 259 20 0.0772 stabilize the system in the upright position 27 312 13 0.0417 Here are some problems taken from our using a PID (Proportion-Integral-Derivative) 28 329 2 0.0061 controller when the system is subject to any various engineering courses which our stu29 280 17 0.0607 external disturbances. This is achieved by dents had to solve. The solutions can be found 30 278 24 0.0863 moving the cart underneath the pendulum to at the end of this newsletter. SUM 8536 753 2.6636 ‘catch’ it before it falls, balancing the penduS IGNALS P ROBLEM lum (by maintaining θ = 0o ). (a) Which type of chart that should be used By NANCY KELLY The classes were divided into teams confor this data set? np chart, p chart, c chart, u sisting of a combination of electrical and mechart, or none of these. chanical engineering students. Determine an expression of X(jω) for the Why? (b) Provide an appropriate title for the control signal x(t) shown in the figure. chart based on the context of the problem and appropriate axis titles x(t) Chart title: 2 X-axis title: Y-axis title: (c) Determine the value of the centerline to 1 within 0.01. (d) Provide the equations for the UCL and -3 3 -2 -1 0 1 2 LCL, and provide the calculations for the 5th driver. -1 (e) Interpret the control chart. What can the The mechanical engineering students, company conclude about the first month of -2 who took EME 323: Machine Component operation and what are your recommendaDesign, made detailed CAD (Computertions to the company? Aided-Design) drawings of their designs prior DATA A NALYSIS P ROBLEM C ONTROLS P ROBLEM to fabricating the physical system. While evBy ANTHONY WALDENMAIER By ANTHONY GARCIA ery team had their own design, each consisted of a cart driven by a belt and DC motor, with a pendulum attached to a potentiometer to A ridesharing app (such as Uber or Lyft) has For the following system: begun service in a new city and has not had a determine its current angular position. The electrical engineering students, who favorable first month. took EEL 421: Electronics II, designed, modeled and assembled an analog PID controller using operational amplifiers, MOSFETS, and variable resistors to adjust the controller gain where: parameters. The performance of their built 1 analog PID controllers were compared to digG(s) = (s + 1)(s + 2)(s + 5) itally applied PID (via arduino microcontrollers) adjusting the brightness of an LED to and the uncompensated system that achieves verify their performance. a percent overshoot of 25% has dominant In EEL 405: Control Systems, the stu- The company reviewed data from the first four closed loop poles at s = −0.939±j2.151 with dents integrated the cart and pendulum sys- weeks across all 30 drivers and collected in- a gain of K = 23.72 tem with the PID controllers. Students then formation on the number of rides provided needed to characterize the mechanical and and the number of poor ratings (PR) given to (a) Sketch the root locus of the system
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(b) Design a PD controller, C(s), that cuts • The lateral-torsional buckling modificaBy ERIC GARCIA the settling time in half, while maintaintion factor, Cb , shall be incorporated. ing a 25% overshoot (determining the placement of any added poles or zeros Given: Determine: and the gain value K) • A simply supported W18x35 beam uniQ 1. The flexural capacity (φMn ) of the W18 (s + pi ) formly loaded and the factored flexural beam using hand calculations. C(s) = K Q (s + zi ) moment (Mu ) equals 250 K-FT. (c) Determine the gains for the proportional (Kp ) and derivative (Kd ) controller components S TEEL D ESIGN P ROBLEM
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Across 1 10am Wednesdays 3 Created the first nuclear reactor 6 Math and Science building (abbreviation) 9 Linux operating system for smart phones 11 Best text editor 12 Solid form less dense than liquid 13 Dry erase marker 14 Units 16 Required math (Abrev.) 19 Previous UMary President (2 words) 20 First female computer scientist 21 18th century French philosopher 23 Upper edge of a ship’s sides 25 Juniper drink 26 prayer’s end 29 Thousandths of an inch 32 EEL304 swarm simulation 33 Language developed by SUN microsystems 35 103 36 Utility vehicle 37 Library named after Sister Thomas 38 Engineering prof and new father 39 Structural steel member 42 First man 43 Twisting from applied torque 44 Sensor for windspeed 45 Operating system for old PC’s Down 1 School Mascot 2 Sponsored the Crow’s Nest 4 Brazilian engineering prof (first name) 5 Monitors the electric power grid 7 Engineering major that requires steel design 8 Tiny linux computer (2 words) 10 Original term for a Spice program 15 Prof Dickhut’s company (2 words) 17 Strange Attractor 18 Foundational Engineering course 22 Big Blue 23 2018 Day of Service project (3 words) 24 University center (2 words) 27 His laws of motion 28 Team name 30 36th president 31 Wrote the Rule 34 Used to make fertilizer or explosives (2 words) 37 Guerrilla 40 Shell scripting language 41 Live in Richardton 43 Linux file compression utility
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S ENIOR D ESIGN P ROJECTS
This fall, our senior level students will be starting their design projects. The first semester of their senior year the students are required to work on a design project within their own discipline and, in the second semester, the students are required to work on cross disciplinary design projects that involve at least one student from each of the branches of engineering that we offer. We believe that cross disciplinary projects will better prepare students for their future careers and give them more practice working together with a diverse team in accomplishing a common goal and to divide a project into sub-projects that lend themselves to the various skill sets. Additionally, this division of labor will require leadership and cooperation and it will show them how to maximize the group productivity by leveraging the individual strengths and the different educational backgrounds of each of the members. If you work for a company that has projects for our senior level engineering stu-
dents, please contact us. We plan to collect as many projects as we can from local engineering-related companies and allow our students to choose one of them to work on and form groups according to individual interest. The best projects are ones which are important to your company and which will give the students the opportunity to impress you with their abilities.
E THEREAL D ELIGHTS By TERRY PILLING
There is a famous triptych oil painting in the Museo del Prado in Madrid called The Garden of Earthly Delights. It was painted between 1490 and 1510 by Netherlands painter Hieronymus Bosch. The left panel of the painting shows the Garden of Eden, the right panel shows Hell, and the center panel shows “The Garden of Earthly Delights.”
Since the 1500s there have been many different interpretations of the work and what its symbolism represents. Some say it is an admonition of our worldly desires and a warning of life’s temptations. Others say it is an “erotic derangement that turns us all into voyeurs.” In any case, we are not here to judge the work. Your appreciation of its artistic value, or lack thereof, is a personal matter. Instead, we want
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to explore an entirely different form of art. matical equations of engineering. crystal of silicon and it obeys the Shockley Namely, the art found in science, engineering, The dictionary definition of the adjective Diode Equation: and mathematics. ethereal is V D VT I = IS e − 1 Ethereal: extremely delicate and light in a way that seems too perwhere I is the diode current, IS ≈ 1.0×10−12 , fect for this world. is the reverse bias saturation current, VD is The equations that describe nature are often the voltage across the diode, VT ≈ 0.026V, stunningly elegant and beautiful in a way that is the thermal voltage defined by VT = kT /q can hardly be expressed to those not versed in for temperature T in Kelvins, Boltzmann conthe language of mathematics and I think that stant k, and elementary electric charge q. ethereal is a pretty good way to describe them. Since the exponential part of the equation is For example, to the untrained eye, Einstein’s usually much larger than 1, we will neglect the 1 and write the diode equation as equation for gravity: It is well known that there are many artistic aspects of science and engineering. Examples range from the sketches of machines found in Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks to the classical Doric architecture of the Parthenon in Athens. However, it doesn’t stop there. There are equally glorious forms of art revealed by the technical instruments of our trade.
Astronomers and Astrophysicists find beautiful spiral galaxies, nebulae, and even blackholes2 in the vast deep of the large-scale universe as revealed by their telescopes. Biologists and chemists find amazing beauty under their microscopes at even the most minute scales of matter from the tiny insects and creatures that live at millimeter scales to the geometrical patterns found in molecules, such as Fullerenes, at the micrometer scales.
The technical instruments we have designed for science and engineering have shown us beauty in nature that could not even be imagined by the artists of the Renaissance. In fact, art is one of the many delightful things that draws us to careers in these subjects. In this article we won’t be exploring such earthly things as buildings, bugs, buckyballs, and Bosch. Instead, we would like to discuss an even more ethereal form of art, namely, the art that one finds while exploring the mathe2
Rµν
VD
1 8πG − Rgµν + Λgµν = 4 Tµν 2 c
may just look like a bunch of weird Greek symbols, but to the mathematically adept it is one of the most beautiful equations of nature. It contains pictures of galaxies and nebulae, wormholes and timewarps, comets, black holes, and even the big bang and the subsequent expansion of the universe. We use it to put land rovers on Mars and men on the moon. Even the global positioning system (GPS) that we all have on our phones depends crucially on Einstein’s equation for its accurate operation. All of this can be teased from that one equation by a curious and diligent explorer who is adept at the language that nature is written in. When you understand this language the world opens up in glory before you like one emerging from Plato’s cave, or by taking the Red Pill in The Matrix. I will assume that the readers of Engineering Quarterly are already somewhat conversant in the language of mathematics and so I can now proceed to show you some beauty I have recently found. Let’s talk about Shockley’s diode equation. When electrical engineering students reach their junior year they take the first of two electronics courses. Here at the University of Mary these are EEL 321 and EEL 421. It is in these courses that they first encounter non-linear electric circuits. Non-linear circuits are found whenever silicon is involved and, in today’s world, this means they are everywhere around us. In fact, you are carrying hundreds of silicon chips around in your pocket right now. They are inside every electronic item you own from your TV to your truck and they are busy performing billions of computations each second in order to make your life easier. The term non-linear comes from the equations that these circuit elements obey. They are non-linear differential equations and usually cannot be solved exactly but, rather, must be solved iteratively on a computer. The first non-linear circuit element encountered by electrical engineers is the Diode. Everyone has seen diodes in the form of light emitting diodes or LED’s, and probably most of you have them lighting your homes by now. The diode is a two-terminal electronic component, meaning that it has two wires sticking out of it that you hook things up to. The type of diode that we will discuss is made from a
I = IS e nVT Students use this equation when they asked to solve the following circuit for the current, ID , around the circuit, and the voltage drop, VD , across the diode. R ID +
+
V
VD −
−
When you solve this circuit you get two equations involving ID and VD , the first comes from the Shockley equation and the second comes from current conservation: V 1 ID = − VD + R R which we can see is actually the equation of a line with slope −1/R and intercept V /R. Since the Shockley diode equation and the circuit analysis equation are both equations for the current ID , the solution will be the value of the voltage VD for which they both give the same answer. One way we can find this value is graphically. We simply plot a graph of both equations as lines on the same paper and find the point where the lines cross. Here is a graph showing the lines representing the two equations where we have used V = 10 volts as the source voltage and R = 10 Ω as the resistance:
We see that the solution, where the two lines cross, is at around VD ≈ 0.72 and corresponds to a current of ID ≈ 0.92 or so. These results are not very precise since we are merely eyeballing it. To get a better answer we write a computer program that finds the value iteratively. In other words, you first “guess” a value for VD , then you plug it into the diode equation to get the resulting ID , then
For those of you are haven’t heard, astronomers have finally taken a picture of an actual black hole! they combined forces with a number of telescopes around the world and photographed the black hole at the center of the M87 galaxy. You can find pictures and the report via an internet search. Note that one of the telescopes involved in the discovery was the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope on Mauna Kea. Dr. Terry Pilling spent several months in Hawaii working on the control systems of that telescope.
Engineering Quarterly SPRING 2019
VOL.I. . . No.3
you plug that value of ID into the circuit equation to get a new value for VD , and so on. You repeat the process, iteratively like this, back and forth between the two equations, until the resulting values no longer change. You have then found the solution to whatever your desired accuracy. Since the exponential grows rapidly the numbers easily get too big for the computer to handle, so instead we will invert the equation and solve it using the natural logarithm rather than the exponential. ID VD = VT ln IS
values for the parameters, whereas cyan will indicate two solutions, orange for three solutions, etc. I have computed these for the coordinate values of every pixel and colored them according to the number of solutions that result. I have only done it for 19 different colors because of the limitations of my computer and so any points that lead to more than 19 solutions I have simply colored black. Here is the result:
Here is the code: diode.c # i n c l u d e < s t d i o . h> # i n c l u d e <math . h> v o i d main ( v o i d ) { i n t N = 5 ; / / num i t e r a t i o n s f l o a t Vd = 0 . 5 ; / / i n i t g u e s s f l o a t Id ; f o r ( i n t i = 0 ; i <N; i ++) { I d = (10.0 −Vd ) / 1 0 . 0 ; Vd = 0 . 0 2 6 ∗ l o g ( I d / 1 . 0 e −12) ; } p r i n t f ( ”Vd=%f \ t I d =%f \n ” , Vd , I d ) ; }
and when we run it we get Vd=0.716474
Id=0.928353
which is very close to what we figured it should be when we just guessed from the graph. Now let’s try something for fun. Let’s go back to the exponential expression and iterate it again. However, instead of using our voltage as simply 10 volts as we did in the student example above, let’s now assume that the voltage source is an oscillating one. Let’s assume that the voltage source can be written as V = V0 ejωt+φ ≡ α + jβ where V0 is the amplitude, ω is the frequency, and φ is a phase shift. The last expression comes from using Euler’s formula: ejθ = cos(θ) + j sin(θ) and rewriting the √ voltage as a complex number (where j = −1). If we now plug this complex number in for V and iterate our expression we find that we get not just a single solution for VD and ID as we did in the direct current case, but instead we get multiple solutions for different values for the source voltage parameters α and β. Sometimes we get two different solutions that cycle back and forth between them every second iteration, sometimes we get three different solutions that cycle through every three iterations, in fact, we get all possible periodic solutions for different choices of the source parameters! In order to visualize these solutions we will use a trick. We will draw a graph where the x and y axes correspond to the two source parameters α and β and we will compute the number of solutions for each point on the graph. I.e. for every pixel on the α-β plane we will run the iteration and find out how many separate solutions we get. Then we will color each pixel according to that number of solutions. For example light blue will mean you get only one solution if you start with those
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Y-axis title: Proportion of P Poor Ratings 753 (c) Centerline = u̇ = P ncii = 8536 = 0.09 Where ci is the number of poor ratings for driver i, and ni is the number of rides given by driver i. q (d) UCL = u̇ + 3 nu̇i q = 0.0882 + 3 0.0882 = 0.1444 q 251 LCL = u̇ − 3 nu̇i = 0.0.0320 (e) It is clear that the process is not in control because there are 5 points outside of the control limits for the data (2 points below and 3 points above) - there are 5 drivers who do not conform to the distribution, meaning that these 5 drivers are irregular compared to the remaining drivers in terms of number of poor ratings per ride. Drivers 19 and 28 have an abnormally low amount of poor ratings, while drivers 8, 22, and 23 have an abnormally high amount of poor ratings per ride. As a result, the company should look into each of these 5 drivers and determine what special causes are occurring with these 5 drivers. The two drivers below the control limit reflects a low number of poor ratings per ride; which is likely a good thing (particularly friendly, provide additional services like free water bottles to passengers, low wait times, clean car etc.). The 3 drivers who are above the upper limit have a high amount of poor ratings per ride, which would indicate inadequate service in the eyes of the passengers. There may be many causes behind these ratings, and it is unlikely a common aspect across each of the three drivers; but may include rudeness, unclean vehicle, unsafe driving, long delays, etc. It is suggested that the 3 poorly rated drivers adopt the practices of other drivers in the study, which may include training or implementation of tips from the 2 drivers below the lower control limit.
Every point in the picture corresponds to a solution to the diode equation with a different pair of starting parameters and colored according to the number of solutions. When you are alone in your office or laboratory studying the electrical currents and voltages in silicon diodes and you see this colorful garden appear on your screen it is awesome. Clearly, nature holds some delightful secrets that are just waiting for a curious observer to coax to the surface. I think a fitting title for this plot would be The Garden of Ethereal Delights since the soothing nature of its ethereal elegance stands in contradistinction to the base and wince-worthy decadence thrust upon us by the more earthly garden of Controls Problem: Hieronymus Bosch. (a) I hope that even the non-mathematical reader can appreciate the magnificent beauty that we engineers and scientists sometimes discover while exploring the mathematical equations of nature. Engineering is not all pocket protectors and slide rules – there is art in it as well!
S OLUTIONS TO P ROBLEMS Signals Problem: (b) C(s) = 20.98(s + 3.98) 2 X(jω) = 8j sin (ω). x(t) is real and odd, ω (c) C(s) = Kd s + Kp = 20.98s + 83.55 and as expected, X(jω) is imaginary and odd. Steel Design Problem: 1. φMn = 232.7 K-FT 2. Not Adequate 3. W18x40 Data Analysis Problem: (a) This data set should use the u-chart. It is attribute data (poor ratings) as opposed to variables data (numerical), and the area of opportunity for each driver unequal (unequal number of rides per driver) (b) Chart Title: Poor Rating Proportion for Drivers X-axis title: Driver Number Designation
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