Senior Design Project....in the works!

So Randon and his friend Alex have been working not only on all their regular class work, but have also been working long hours in the machine shop on their Senior Design Project. This semester they are building the design. Last semester was spent designing on paper, doing calculations and analysis, modeling, and planning for the prototyping phase.

Here is what they are doing for there project, in a nut shell and in layman's terms. (It's taken me a whole semester to be able to tell about this without sounding like a total moron...so be proud of me). There is a certain aircraft part called a Thrust Recovery Valve, that attaches to a plane and helps to regulate the cabin pressure, and use the excess pressure to provide additional thrust for the plane. Randon's project is to build a device that will measure the thrust produced by a Thrust Recovery Valve. So...I'm not gonna lie that's as much as I know. When he starts getting into the details and the actual design, he loses me. So here are a few pictures and videos for you to learn for yourself.



Above is pictures of the valve I was talking about.


They use a computer controlled machine that is
programmed to cut a specific shape from the metal.


Randon is carefully watching the machine make an important cut.


Alex is using a machine to shape a square plate of metal into a circle


This is the top and bottom pieces of the sealant portion of the design...


This is prototype of the sealant portion of the design made out of the two plates described before and fabric. The real one will be made out of silicon.

This is a bunch of the parts for their design cut
out of a ginormous piece of metal.


They stacked the parts into a castle, and Randon is
being excited.