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Senior Design Expo to showcase engineering students’ projects |
| By
Vicki L. Kroll |
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Apr 25, 2006 |
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A hands-free industrial log splitter. An all-terrain wheelchair for use in Oak Openings Metropark. A Web program that allows hospital patients to communicate with distant family members. A sump pump failure alert system. These are a few of the 41 projects that will be featured in the College of Engineering’s Senior Design Exposition.
The expo will take place Friday, April 28, from noon to 2:30 p.m. on the first floor of Nitschke Hall.
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| UT senior Jeff Reinhart tests an all-terrain wheelchair he helped design as Dr. Mohamed Samir Hefzy assesses the project. |
“The projects speak for themselves,” said Dr. Mohamed Samir Hefzy, UT professor of mechanical, industrial and manufacturing engineering (MIME) and associate dean for graduate studies in the College of Engineering. “We have been continuously funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) since 1993.”
The Senior Design Clinic was founded by Christine Smallman, director of college relations and facilities management in the College of Engineering.
“The exposition used to be just MIME, but when [Dr.] Nagi [Naganathan] went from chair of the department to college dean and I went with him, we approached Dr. Hefzy about opening it up to the whole college,” Smallman said. “Now all the departments join MIME for the exposition.”
As of 2005, 338 engineering students have designed 81 projects. Senior MIME students are required to take a capstone course; in one semester, they must design, construct and test a device to meet a client’s specifications.
“Dr. Hefzy touches the lives of so many undergraduate students. He really exposes them to research through these projects,” Smallman said.
And he helps those in need in the process. Providing assistance to people with disabilities is something Hefzy has wanted to do since his college days.
“I had a friend in Cincinnati who was in a wheelchair because of an accident that he had a long time ago back in Egypt. That individual was a survivor. We both were graduate students living in the same dorm at the University of Cincinnati,” Hefzy recalled. “One week after he defended his Ph.D., he had a stroke. He’s not able to talk or do anything. That is why individuals with disabilities have a special place in my heart, because of that young man who was a close friend of mine.”
So when Hefzy learned the NSF had a program to fund engineering students to work on constructing prototypes to aid persons with disabilities, he teamed up with a physician from the Medical College of Ohio (now Medical University of Ohio) rehabilitation department and applied for a grant in 1992.
“It’s a very competitive grant,” Hefzy said. “Only 21 universities in the country were funded. We have been continuously funded since then.”
He explained the NSF grant has three goals.
“The first is to provide undergraduate engineering students with an opportunity to design and construct a project that has a real need by people with disabilities,” Hefzy said.
“The second goal is to help people with disabilities to get access to some gizmo-type thing that otherwise they would not have. It must have a unique feature; it must be something you can’t go and buy at a store.
“The third goal is to provide universities with an opportunity to get involved in the community,” he said.
Initially, the UT Senior Design Clinic received requests for projects from MUO and later from Metro Health Systems in Cleveland, the Ability Center of Greater Toledo, St. Vincent Mercy Medical Center and the UT Office of Accessibility.
Each project receives $750 from NSF. Then Smallman finds additional funds and equipment through donations.
“We don’t stop at anything. We will do whatever it takes to help with these projects,” Smallman said. “And the reasons are obvious. These projects make such a difference in people’s lives. They are getting back some freedom.”
Take Bill Abrams of Toledo, for example. He was paralyzed after falling out of tree while hunting. “It bothered Bill that he couldn’t mow his lawn. He loved mowing his lawn,” Smallman said. “We had a group of students re-engineer his riding lawn mower so he could mow his lawn. He was so touched that he could take this one task away from his wife.”
In addition to helping with tasks, the UT Senior Design Clinic assists with recreation.
“I think we have developed an expertise with racing wheelchairs,” Hefzy said. “When you talk about people with disabilities, usually you just talk about basic needs. To me basic needs are everything a normal person does, including sports and exercise.”
This year seniors Jeff Reinhart, Hicham Elias and Sami Al Salahat designed and built a second all-terrain wheelchair to be used at Oak Openings Metropark.
“Oak Openings has sand dunes that the wheelchair will help tame,” Reinhart said. “We also worked out some kinks from the original. There were some issues with wrists and arms rubbing on the tires as it was being used, so we added spacing to the hand rings and arm rests.”
The students also included a second brake to the wheelchair and created a sliding mechanism for the seat assembly to foster a safer transfer into the chair.
“This course has taught me to give consideration to the human aspect of design,” Reinhart said. “It’s one thing to design a project to work well and be safe, but it’s quite another to make it useable for a wide range of people.”
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