Matthew's Blog for ENG 198

Jingle Bells

2009-12-08T20:54:00.001-08:00

For the second Eng 198 project, we were given an Arduino kit and $100 bucks to build something that did something. Many groups decided on something that moved around a lot or had a function similar to a clock... we didn't. Having many years of musical experience, I lead my group in making a bass guitar playing robot, Sting. He would pluck the strings to a programmed rhythm while a person would fret the bass. The idea was to allow either a one handed or poorly-rhythmic person to learn to play a popular instrument with a device that could also be adapted to a guitar. In the end, the project worked out well without costing anything more than the arduino kit. It took a while for the robot and me to get in sync, but when we were the obvious tune of Jingle Bells reverberated around the room.

Here is a video of the device still in its conditioning stage, with jingle bell's rhythm hidden in the video.

iExpo

2009-12-08T20:37:00.000-08:00

We all got together for the finally presentation of the semester. We had our parents come, some iCOAs, and our great leaders. I managed to get polos with the EI logo for everyone so that we could have group uniformity that represented our hard work and effort while supporting a small business. We gave our presentation, covering our main goals and achievements throughout the semester, played our video, and summed up with some Q&A. I was interested to see the progress of the other groups and was amazed by some of their efforts and success. iFoundry's iTeams have set a standard for the following classes to meet by working hard and together to accomplish amazing goal, gain great opportunities, and explore the interests unhindered.

iExpo Unrated

2009-12-08T20:27:00.000-08:00

Here is a link to the original iExpo video. Aman's part is different with some audio problems. There is also an extra goodie left out of the one at iExpo. Enjoy.

Ethics

2009-12-08T19:42:00.001-08:00

Professor Loui gave a lecture on ethics. He covered the basic does and don't when looking at education, jobs, and engineering especially. He discussed the basic principles that cheating is the same as stealing and should never be done. Personal patents and those owned by companies are a large focus of engineering ethics. He also addressed different conflict examples, such as an engineer at GM who gets a job for Ford would not be allowed to give his knowledge that he gained at GM to Ford as GM owns his patents and knowledge from his employment at GM. The ethics lesson was very informative but was far to short as he made obvious at the end by selling a list of different ethics classes we can take.

iFoundry Presentations

2009-12-08T17:54:00.000-08:00

After half a semester of working with my EI team, I finally got to present our work to everyone. I prepared a video made of students' answers to why they love engineering. Video worked out, but the presentation of it took a while since the computer wasn't ready.

The most interesting part was figuring out what everyone else had been doing. While EI had been working on a big marketing and engineering plan of EZ movie and possible other inventions, the other groups had been working on creating a greener campus and the importance of art in engineering. The meeting was a great way to compare our progress and see if I had made the right choice in groups... I think I did.

Anyone can draw!

2009-12-08T17:36:00.000-08:00

One of my favorite lessons this year revolved around the little red book, "The Back of the Napkin," by Dan Roam. He put it so plainly as anyone can draw. Not everyone is an artist, but we can all draw some lines, maybe not as straight as an architect, but we can all draw. We can use this simple ability to plan, communicate, brainstorm, and visualize. While some artists are painter, some sculptors, and some AutoCAD wizards, everyone can pull ideas from their head into a visual drawing on something as small as a napkin. We can easily brainstorm by listing our market, our manufacturing, and our purpose. By transforming these into simple flow charts, the obvious solutions begin to appear. We then take these ideas and run them through some basic questions such as who and how many people are buying, where is our business, and why should we even bother? Then he put it together by explaining how to use these abilities to sell your product to a company by making them see what you saw all along the planning process.

Recalling the First Project

2009-12-08T16:47:00.000-08:00

The first project of iFoundry was to build a stem car. While we were given instructions on how build it, my group decided to change it up by moving around the engine and the chassis design. The new design was revolved around aerodynamics and efficiency of the engine. We spent a lot of hours laboring on the parts such as welding the spokes onto the wheels. We also had to create the boiler and build the whole car around the chassis which had to be the last part made based on our design. Finally we had our finished product; the sleek car that Bruce Wayne would love to drive. The car was working until the competition however. Its wicks had burned to far and went out a minute before the race which completely prevented us from competing. Overall, the project was a success, it just didn't turn out on game day.

Gettings To Know Others

2009-10-23T18:46:00.000-07:00

When iFoundry first started, we all went a 4-H camp and participated in team building exercises. The video includes a couple of things we did along with our funny counselor. Sorry for the low volume, you will likely have to turn your speakers up a lot.

After the team building exercises, we got to see a magician. In the morning, we were divided into our iTeams in which we began planning our goals.