Contents1 Kummer Design Center2 Formula SAE2 Engineers Without Borders3 Human Powered Vehicle4 Advanced Aero Vehicle 4 Solar Car4 Solar House5 iGem5 Concrete Canoe6 Steel Bridge6 Robotics6 H2Design7 Mars Rover Team7 Baja SAE7 Director’s Award8 Miners By Design

The workshop floor is newly cleaned and polished, excess machinery is headed out the door, and shop manager Richard Dalton’s card-swipe system, designed so that only trained design team members use production machinery, is nearly complete.

Movable workstations been a boon to student teams, adding workspace flexibility without causing serious disruption to works in progress. Separate welding and composite/paint rooms have kept dust and fumes away from the main work areas, providing a safe and comfortable workplace for students and visitors alike.

As in life, some of the first-year assumptions about how things would operate ran headlong into reality. SDELC staff and students simply adapted paper plans to the new environs, just as they would in a real workplace. Students in particular came up with ideas to improve workflow and maximize workplace efficiency, concepts that were quickly put into action.

During the summer break the center installed new computers better able to support the students’ growing data-crunching needs, as projects get bigger and more complex each year.

Second-year goals for the Kummer Student Design Center include tweaking the CNC mill and lathe so design teams can get their specialized components built in-house and at a lower cost.

Fall 2012 - Newsletter

“There’s more to engineering than just engineering”

Student Design and Experiential Learning Center

Kummer Student Design Center:Celebrating Year One

2012 was nearly the break-out year Missouri S&T Racing has long sought. In Michigan the Miners took 5th in design presentation, their best score ever, and clawed their way into the fastest group in the endurance race. In Nebraska S&T dominated the dynamic events, winning skid pad and autocross, again ending up in the fastest endurance group. In both cases finishing endurance meant a certain podium finish (Michigan) and a guaranteed victory (Nebraska), but small, last-minute mechanical problems wiped out S&T’s best racing season ever.

The Miners headed to Germany’s Formula Student competition, with one over-riding objective: FINISH ENDURANCE!

2012 marked the first time an SDELC team competed in Europe, and the Miners made the most of it by convincingly winning skidpad and taking third in autocross in their “big American hotrod.” S&T’s massive aero package even edged past Formula Electric teams which typically outperform combustion vehicles. That driving performance earned S&T their 3rd endurance race finale of the year, this time against a German-American partnership and three top European teams.

S&T driver Alec Surrat quickly passed one car and in a tour-de-force of design, driver skill and vehicle handling left the other machines lagging behind in a fight for second place. Unfortunately during the mid-race driver change S&T was one of two cars that suffered battery problems and wouldn’t restart. The Miners were denied a top-ten overall finish, which would have been a tremendous feat for any first-time entrant. While they went 0-for-3 in endurance the Miners attracted a lot of attention from students and sponsors

alike. One awe-struck student said, “I’d always dreamed of seeing the big Missouri S&T car, and I can’t believe I’m actually seeing it in person!” Some big European auto manufacturers were even asking, “What will it take to get our logo on your car?”

It’s not just about building the best race car; this group set out to

prove they were some of the best race car engineers, and the world sat up and took notice. What was to be a one-time test may well turn out to be an annual S&T event.

Formula SAE

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Engineers Without Borders Missouri S&T’s Engineers Without Borders chapter focuses on long-term support to partner communities in Bolivia, Guatemala, and Honduras. The Miners take an “OK, what can we do next?” approach to improving the living standards in each client village. Once sanitation and clean water projects are completed the student/townspeople partnerships turn their attention to economic issues to help strengthen communities for the long run. Both sides win when these cooperative efforts tackle more technical projects. S&T students get unmatched global experience and the communities become more self-sufficient. The ideas and practices don’t just stop at the edge of town. Other nearby communities learn from these successes so the knowledge and benefits provided by S&T students, staff and faculty continue to spread.

The 2012 Human Powered Vehicle Team’s season is best described as so close. In Pennsylvania they fought through frigid weather and were bested by just 1.1 points, while the Utah ASME event just a week later, was even closer. At the west coast event powerful Cal Poly held a safe lead going into the endurance race, but with strong starts by Nikia Chapman and Jon Sanders, great follow-on efforts by Eric Audiffred, Peter Freiberger and Kevin Pence, and near penalty-free tactics, the Miners rallied to tie for 1st place. That team effort proved to be the difference, as the endurance race results broke the tie and put Missouri S&T into the winner’s column and gave them the $1,400 top prize. Their return to Rolla was made even sweeter with a mountain-bike ramble at Moab, Utah, and some proud team supporters who added another $1,600 to the victory pot.

Human Powered Vehicle

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Current Projects:• Los Eucaliptos, Bolivia.EWB continued to expand the gabion spurs built last summer to prevent riverbank erosion, and are currently designing solutions to solve flooding issues that occur during the rainy season. Up next: Well drilling to provide a reliable water source.

• Tacachia, BoliviaLand preservation tops the community’s list of concerns because their economy is wholly based on agriculture. Chiara Sulze says, “...the team will fight river erosion by excavating the opposite riverbank, redirecting the flow through less valuable land. We also worked to complete Tacachia’s water distribution system.” Next: A more reliable and safe drinking water source.

• Nahualate, GuatemalaIn mid-July the Guatemala team finished the assessment of the distribution system. The well is almost finished, and the next two steps of the project are constructing the elevated water tank and distribution system to provide the community with potable water. Coming up: Nearing completion of the well hardware.

• Santiago, HondurasMeasurements taken during this summer’s trip indicated severe pressure drops in the water distribution system. Emma Bradford says, “we used flow meters to conduct a leak study and found pipe installation problems which we corrected with the community’s help.” Automatic well pumps were sucessfully installed so the community’s system can remain pressurized. Next Task: Community training on permanent pipe repairs.

For the second year in a row AAVG scored very well in both presentation and design, taking 2nd and 3rd place respectively. The Miners rallied from a severe crash to rebuild the plane and fly just hours later, and their critical data acquisition system worked flawlessly. SAE Chief Engineer John Schaefer says “the 2013 plan is to eliminate the roll-preventing polyhedral wing tips and design a new engine configuration to produce significantly more thrust. This will increase low-speed performance characteristics and allow for a smaller,

lighter plane capable of carrying a larger payload”. S&T’s remarkable rocket design didn’t just use power - it produced it. The missile’s sabot-like shape incorporated intakes for an internal generator. The on-board systems recorded how much energy could be produced to potentially operate on-board equipment on future flights. Though a payload sensor problem invalidated the experiment’s results, the rocket flew extremely well, reaching 4,600 feet and successfully deployed its parachute and safely drifted to the ground. AAVG will pass up NASA’s rocket competition to hold a series of in-house rocket workshops and test flights to build experience among younger team members, then return stronger to the Huntsville, Alabama event in 2014.

Advanced Aero Vehicle Group

Solar CarFall 2012 starts a rebuilding process for the Solar Miner squad. S&T sat out the American Solar Challenge to strengthen their financial position, improve their electronic systems, redo some mechanical systems, and broaden their advisor base to come back strong for 2013. Their Formula Sun Grand Prix (FSGP) race will be especially popular for Southern California Miner fans, who can see both S&T Solar Car and Solar House teams at FSGP and the Department of Energy’s Solar Decathlon Energy Expo, scheduled in October of 2013, in Irvine, California.

Solar House In August Chancellor Cheryl Schrader joined the Solar House Team to celebrate the official groundbreaking for Missouri S&T’s Chameleon House. The teams’ design was accepted into the 6th Department of Energy’s Solar Decathlon, which is relocating to the Los Angeles area for 2013. The Chameleon House, as the name suggests, is an adaptable living environment that transforms to suit the needs of the occupants and their environment. The floor plan, 25% larger than previous decathlon entries, touts a compartmentalized storage system, reconfigurable kitchen and bedroom cabinets, and a transforming table. Its blend of traditional passive solar features, modular living space, advanced automation, and highly-engineered photovoltaic

and solar thermal energy system allows the occupants to feel truly in control of the space. 4

Join Miners by Design and support the S&T student design teams!See page 8.

Get the Missouri S&T design team story at: Experiencethis.mst.edu

Julie Whitehead’s crew started the build cycle early enough to build a second canoe when the first one developed a severe crack, and that can-do spirit served them well at competition. Their 2012 watercraft, Gold Rush, complete with its mineshaft and railcar display, was a homage to S&T’s original founding mission. Canoe races are highly unpredictable and sometimes comical, but S&T shone where it counted. The Miners earned top honors in

design and 3rd in oral presentation. Thanks to a healthy coat of duct tape, Gold Rush held together for the women to surpass the Miner men with 3rd and 5th place in sprints and endurance, while the S&T men managed 4th and 6th, respectively. More important, the canoe team’s operations and planning were exceptional, leaving the group well-prepared for 2013 .

Concrete Canoe

iGEM joined the SDELC as the center’s first bioengineering design team, shortly after being named Student Council’s “Most Improved Student Organization” for 2011. Since their microbial glucose sensor design won a silver medal at the North America Regional Jamboree, the S&T iGEM team has been busy. Team leaders Amanda Foster and Erica Shannon used data developed for that project to author a research paper and oral presentation which won first place at S&T’s 2011 Undergraduate Research Conference (URC), while Tavia Hall and David Pohlman took home 1st and 2nd place respectively, in the URC’s project proposal division the following year.

Amanda Foster says “we’ve started an extensive lab training program to verse new members in molecular biology lab techniques. iGEM also continued our efforts to gauge public opinion and educate the community about synthetic biology through informational events, including a hands-on event called Exploring Synthetic Biology.”

“Our short-term priority is to learn the SDELC’s annual RFP process, at the same time we’re gearing up for the October regional event.”-Amanda Foster

International Genetically Engineered Machines

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Steel Bridge

The Missouri S&T Steel Bridge Design Team is ready for a big year. “We learned a lot from our experiences at the regional competition in Nebraska and from the observations at the national competition over the summer,” says Sarah Padgett. “Those small details can be a deal breaker. When a piece wiggled loose and cost us an opportunity to compete nationally we learned to focus heavily on ensuring that those details don’t get overlooked this competition year. Our team officers

attended nationals to see a variety of excellent bridge designs that focused on simplicity and well-rehearsed fabrication. We’ll take these lessons to heart and incorporate them into our process this year. As always, we continue our focus on building relationships among team members, safe design and construction practices, and the practical application of the lessons we get in the classroom.”

Robotics The Missouri S&T Robotics Team has retired the JoeMegatron chassis from competition. “Joe” will still serve as an AI test platform to aid the development of the next generation of artificial intelligence while the team develops a new system to adapt to changing IGVC requirements. New to the challenge are waypoints the machines must find after clearing the obstacle course. Instead of just following a marked lane, machines must navigate a second set of obstacles while moving toward multiple coordinates.

Hydrogen Design The new H2 Design Solutions Team soared to 4th place out of 28 international teams in the 2011-2012 Hydrogen Student Design Contest, with 85.8% of all possible points. The two-phase contest required teams to develop a locally-sourced feedstock and energy conversion analysis, then design a campus Combined Heat, Hydrogen and Power (CHHP) system that would generate energy from municipal, agricultural, and industrial waste sources.

Learn, Succeed, and Have Fun!

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Mars Rover S&T’s Mars Rover Design Team (MRDT) got organized in early 2012 and immediately joined the SDELC. Team leader Michael Bouchard says “we’ve already presented a professional paper about the MRDT structure to the American Society of Engineering Education, at their conference in September.” “The team is structured like an engineering firm, with technical and administrative branches. The technical branch is divided in several subteams handling power supply, body and hydraulics, and communication systems, while the administrative branch has publicity and fundraising committees. This systematic approach

allows us to effectively tackle complex problems. Our team is fundamentally interdisciplinary, and currently has 14 majors represented. We can find a place for any student willing to learn new things and work hard. Our plan is to represent Missouri S&T at the University Rover Challenge in Utah next summer.”

Baja SAE

Director’s Award The Steel Bridge Team has been honored with the inaugural Director’s Award, established by SDELC director Dr. Roger A. LaBoube. The new Kummer Center gives the center staff a chance to observe team organization, design, manufacturing, and professionalism to a degree never

before possible. The staff unanimously selected Chris Ferguson’s team as the group that best exemplifies the values of leadership, performance, organization and professionalism that sets Missouri S&T students apart from their peers.

The off-road Miners designed for low vehicle weight, trimming nearly 200 lbs from the previous design and earned 22nd place in acceleration as a result. Speed and weight are important in hill climb and acceleration contests but reliability is key in the chaotic four-hour endurance race. As is common among Baja teams the S&T crew suffered mechanical problems,

in this case a suspension link that required extensive reworking. After the rebuild they went back into the fray and managed six strong endurance laps before the clock ran out. The team took the lessons to heart and opted out of remaining SAE events to keep their budget healthy and improve the design. Central to 2013 success will be rebuilding their membership, setting realistic goals, and improving the team’s documentation and presentation processes. To prevent starting from scratch, they’ll modify their ‘12 chassis to make it more rugged, get a big jump on their manufacturing schedule, and save money.

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1051 N. Bishop Ave116 Kummer Student Design CenterRolla, Missouri65409-1410

design.mst.edu

Student Design and Experiential Learning Center

Team Results:

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NONPROFIT ORG.U.S. POSTAGE

PAIDPERMIT 170ROLLA MO

AAVG SAE Aero 6th USLI Rocket 22nd Baja SAE Auburn Alabama 71stConcrete Canoe Mid-continent ASCE

conference 5th

Formula SAEMichigan Skidpad 1st Autocross 1st Overall 26thNebraska Skidpad 1st Autocross 1st Overall 19thGermany Skidpad 1st Autocross 3rd Overall 36th

Human Powered Vehicle ASME West Coast 1st ASME East Coast 2nd

H2 Design Solutions 4thSteel Bridge Mid-continent ASCE

conference 5thRobot Design 4th Navigation 15th