LAST POST

This post is my response to the class on airplane design. I thought that class was very educational and helpful in learning the basic concept of how planes work. I sort of knew a little about how air foils work from before, but after this class I understood it a lot more. The visualizations and graphs that Robert made also helped me learn everything easily. Also, I liked the little airplanes that we got to use at the beginning of class. I think the planes allowed us to let our imagination sort of run free. The PowerPoint was cool as well. All the pictures of different air crafts were useful in seeing how air crafts have many similarities and differences simultaneously. The coolest part of the class, however, was when Robert flew the little ornithopter around the room and in the hallway. I kind of want to buy one of those things now.

All in all, this was a very informative very fun class.

A7) How could class be taught better??

The lesson on computer programming was the only thing I had a problem with. I, personally, don’t know much about programming, or at least not what was talked about in class. And I think programming is really hard to learn in an hour and a half which was what we had. I just think we should have just gone over more basic concepts about it such as the different types of computer languages and what they are used for. However, after this class I realized how useful it can be for an engineer to learn computer languages. Now I really want to take a class or buy a book or something to learn some of these languages. I’m not exactly sure what language would be best to start with though. Either way , the class was confusing but inspirational. So it was all good. I also liked the group work we had when we were creating our robot. I wish more of those assignments could be given to make a class a little more interesting.

A6) Rise of the Robots

CLICK HERE!

Here’s a really interesting article i found that talks all about the future of robots. Since we talk a lot about A.I and robots that will can potentially outsmart humans, i thought this article would be appropriate. This guy says that within 10 years or so we can start seeing robots cleaning floors and mowing our lawns. He also says that by 2050 there can be robot “brains” based on computers that can execute 100 trillion instructions per second. Even though it does sound really cool and everything I’m not sure that these robots will be used widespread yet like we see in the movies. I think the robots that we will be seeing will be used in factories or companies to make things faster and more efficient. I don’t think I will be able to have my own personal robot anytime soon at least.

A5. Cool, informative Websites

These are some cool links I found that talk about things that I learned in my seminar on Tuesday. They basically talk about failure analysis, statics and mechanics of materials.

1) Failure Analysis of Electronics Assemblies- This is an article that talks about how to perform failure analysis on electronics in assembly. It’s sort of like a tutorial or like “things to know” before you start the process of failure analysis

2) Failure Types- this site talks about different types of failures that exist such as loose fit, overheating, excessive load, and etc.

3) Strength and Mechanics of Materials- This web site has various terms relating to properties of materials such as stress, strain, young’s modulus, fatigue and toughness. It explains what each term means and even gives formulas to calculate them. I thought they were very handy to have.

4) MecMovies–Mechanics of Materials- I thought it was a pretty cool site. It can be said that it is an integrated learning system i guess. It also has little short little movies.

5) Open Learning Initiative- this is a link to a sort of on line class of engineering statics. It has almost everything you might want to know about statics if you’re interested. Only open until August though.

A3. How might you use what you learned today as an engineer or entrepreneur?

I believe that the lesson on control systems was extremely relevant since most of us want to persue a career as some type of engineer. I think that in today’s advanced society control sytems are important because almost everything that engineers work with have some type of computer running it. Since everyday our world is becoming more and more dependent on some type of artificial intelligence, control sytems are truly needed to help make sure thst everything woks as was first designed. As a future engineer, I have to be ready to make sure I am constructing things as securely as possible. Control systems will put boundaries to machines and make sure they only work under certain conditions. For example, if developing a new gaming system different control systems would need to be implemented in order for it to perform what it was meant to do without any mistakes. One such control system, I believe, might be a control of how to run when the system overheats. So that might be a place where i can use these things.

Also, I really enjoyed learning about how planes fly. It might have nothing to do with what I’m planning on studying in the future but I still think its sort of sweet. In the future I might just want to do something with airplanes just as a hobby of some sort. I would probably want to get my flying license or try to build my own flying thing like those ornithopters. It probably won’t happen, but it i still think it would be cool do something of that sort.

So basically, that was my third seminar in Mechanical, aerospace, and materials in UF. It was pretty exciting

a) What did you find interesting about class today?

In this class session I realized just how important engineers are in today’s society. I also found it cool how technology has been able to change the techniques used in building any type of structure or item. Programs like CAD now facilitate designing and planning big projects. It’s cool how now every engineer can simply use computer programs to simulate different circumstances on  a bridge, for example, and know what needs to be done to make the structure better without even starting to construct anything. I bet this has really made everythingg a lot safer and perfect because it minimizes human error.

Also, I enjoyed learning more about engines and how they sort of work. I, personally do not know much about them but would certainly like to learn more. I like how the main parts were explained thoroughly and how the class was able to participate in saying what they knew about this subject.

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