TEN WEEKs College prep COURSE DETAILS

Students are required to bring lunch. There are limited opportunities to eat nearby and we want to keep students on campus to stay consistent with social distancing practices by limiting exposure. For more information on Health & Safety, please visit the page.

​

Course Syllabus

 

Week One: Shop Safety and Standard Practices. We will discuss and implement coronavirus safety protocol, and ppe in general. We will begin by making a set of geometric figures in 16 gauge mild steel. This week will focus on layout, shearing, cutting, grinding, and GMAW mig welding. On Thursday, we will email a short take home test with answers in essay form, geometric shapes will be measured, must fit height gauge or weight requirements and pass inspection.

 

Week Two: Layout and Fabrication Equipment. We will introduce students to the drill press, horizontal bandsaw, and belt sanders. We will begin working with the cnc plasma equipment available in-house. Students will spend time learning the CAD system used by OMAX, a free downloadable software program that students can use at home to work on projects. Students will be shown how to use the cnc plasma cutter and be asked to design and cut signage using a square foot of 16 gauge sheet metal. Project design will be peer reviewed. 

 

Week Three: Basic Electrical. Students will learn the fundamentals of making 120 volt systems, and understanding higher voltage systems like 208, 220v and three-phase. Students will learn to evaluate electrical safety, watts, amps, volts, ampacity, resistance, wire gauge, fuses, dielectrics. Students will learn to use a multi-meter, continuity tester, wire switches and outlets, test electrical circuits and troubleshoot malfunctions. Students will be asked to wire up a light with a switch in 120 volt and 12 volt, and will move on to progressive challenges. We will disassemble multiple electrical appliances and attempt to cannibalize them to make projects.  

We will attempt to make certifiable electrical connections per aerospace specifications. 

 

Week Four: Structural. Students will engineer solutions to physical problems with results being judged based on mass and effectiveness. Students will break into small teams and design a structure and the skills they have learned to support a dynamic physical mass. Students will be under uniform time and material constraints. 

 

Week Five: GTAW and SMAW welding. Students will learn additional forms of welding. Students will be asked to create a project using welding techniques they have learned recently. Projects will be required to state and meet a set of requirements. Each project must demonstrate comprehension of one or more subjects studied thus far. Projects will be tested and peer reviewed. 

 

Week Six: Group Project. We will ask the group to work together to produce one or more rubens tube. This is a classic physics project which will require the fabrication and testing of several separate systems. Students will be asked to hypothesize how they believe it works, prior to researching the subject, then asked to investigate and present their findings on the physics of a rubens tube. This work will require very careful layout, drilling hundreds of tiny holes, producing leak tight welded volumes, careful thinking, theorizing, and learning how to build and operate a system which has multiple electrical and gas components. 

 

Week Seven: Electromechanical Projects. Students will be asked to build a project which has sensing components that activate an electromechanical result. For example, a beam break which opens or closes an electrical circuit associated with a motor, pneumatic, or solenoid, and produces a predicted and repeatable result to solve a given problem. Students will be asked to present their project and offer feedback on the projects of their peers. 

 

Week Eight: “Project Chain”. Each of the previous weeks’ projects must be operated together in a sequence to achieve a given goal. If any of the projects in the chain fails, the team will work together to troubleshoot, improve, and repair whatever is currently faulty. This process will be repeated over and over until the process meets arbitrary performance goals, for example, a successful cycle of all functioning components for ten out of ten attempts. This is intended to demonstrate how rigorous the engineering must be for critical functions.

 

Week Nine: Metallurgy and Materials Science. We will conduct a series of experiments demonstrating principles like, ductility, hardness, oxidations states brittleness, and stress risers.  We will demonstrate concepts like annealing, tempering, quenching, and stress relieving. If possible we will arrange a tour at a heat treatment facility two blocks away. We will also ask students to produce a small aluminum casting. This will entail making or utilizing an appropriate pattern, casting it in aluminum, inspecting the part for quality, and finishing the part using tools and techniques we have covered previously. 

 

Week Ten: This week will be spent on a student directed project. We will use the previous nine weeks to solicit and select a project that is consistent with the program goals and budget from the students’ suggestions.