Freshmen and Senior Design Project Processes

For today's class we had to interview one freshman and one senior at the design project expo about how their design processes. 

The first group I interviewed was a freshman group that built the "Smart Pop Microwave." They began their process with very limited knowledge of Arduino, MatLab, and LabView. They were inspired to make this product by a student in their dorm hall who is constantly burning popcorn. After much trial and error and learning that microwaves are very difficult to work with, they created a machine that attaches to a microwave and measures the amount of time between the pops of the corn kernels by sound. When the pops are more than one second apart, the microwave turns off. However, the sound sensor is very sensitive to background noise. The team would also desire to go through the actual button board of the microwave if they were to prototype a solution again.

The senior group was designing a formula car for the SAE competition off-road. They had not gotten to the prototyping stage yet, but their evidence and research seemed thorough and convincing. They had taken a design class elective previously which helped them with the design and research process. They even went to an SAE competition to see what a final product could potentially look like. They want their final product to be as cost and energy efficient. They also used a log book to jot down ideas during their design process. Next year, the juniors that are also working on this project will take over the project and use the prototyping experience as their senior projects.

It seemed that, in general, the freshman design projects were more prototype-based whereas the senior projects were more concept and research-based. One reason for this was that the freshmen were required to use Arduino system for their projects. The seniors were not required to use Arduino. But another reason for this difference is due to the fact that the seniors have gained a lot of knowledge throughout their years at WNE and were given more free-range to use that knowledge and research skills without limits. The Arduino gave the freshmen some limitations, but was probably helpful for those who are not experienced with the process of inventing and designing. However, both groups agreed that observing and collaborating with other groups was a great way to test ideas and get inspiration for what to do next.