News Article - MIT Co-Pilot

Technology is advancing every moment of every day, and new advancements routinely come out to futurize our daily lives.  One of the leading fields that embrace this is the mechanical engineering field.  Mechanical Engineers have to adapt to every other fields changes and learn the mechanical and technological changes that lead to the most modern and efficient designs for parts and assemblies.  

So that mentioned, what is one of the most mechanically dependent activities that most of general public relies on on a daily basis?       -  driving a vehicular device

Each year car companies and their engineers develop new technologies to help their cars/trucks become more efficient, more powerful, easier on the eyes, etc.  But there is a new technology that hasn't been developed much that a recent group of mechanical engineers have been working on for a few years. 

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2012/mechanical-engineers-develop-intelligent-car-co-pilot-0713.html

The author of the article is Jennifer Chu, a news reporter at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and she is reporting on a developing story regarding travel technology.  

As the article discusses, a group of mechanical engineers have been researching and developing a co-piloting type system for your daily driver.  There have been systems already produced that have similar qualities, including assisted parking and surrounding surveillance, and the like.   Intelligent Parking Assist System was developed and released in 2004 by Toyota and implemented into their early Japan-only Prius lines, and later adopted by Lexus, and then other similar programs were used by the other large car companies.

The article was an extremely effective one, going into major details throughout it, and diving into the relevance to our daily lives.  She portrayed herself as a thoroughly reliable author, referring to research and sources throughout her article.  This also made her article logical and understandable as well.  

How it affects the Engineering Field

In previous years it was believed (with good reason) that this would be a very difficult task to fulfill, to create a fully auto/co pilot type system in a commuter vehicle.  I mean, it's easy enough to program a car with a guidance system to go where you want it to, without outside interference.  When you want to make a whole co/auto pilot system, there are so many outside influences that come into play: other vehicles, pedestrians, various other road dangers.   This new system involves more intricate details.  The developers integrated a human perspective into their robotic system. The team came up with an approach to identify safe zones, or “homotopies,” rather than specific paths of travel. Instead of mapping out individual paths along a roadway, the researchers divided a vehicle’s environment into triangles, with certain triangle edges representing an obstacle or a lane’s boundary. 

The researchers devised an algorithm that “constrains” obstacle-abutting edges, allowing a driver to navigate across any triangle edge except those that are constrained. If a driver is in danger of crossing a constrained edge — for instance, if he’s fallen asleep at the wheel and is about to run into a barrier or obstacle — the system takes over, steering the car back into the safe zone. 

How it affects the Public

While they are still working out the details, this would be a drastic improvement in the safety of public transportation if it were to be correctly integrated into the commuter-man's vehicle.  I am excited to see future developments regarding this new technology.  

A Review - CREO Parametric 2.0

About CREO Parametric 2.0
PTC CREO is one of the leading 3D CAD (computer aided design) software producers.  Their latest software, CREO Parametric 2.0, is PTC’s greatest product yet.  Modeling, drawing, and especially assemblies become smoother, more efficient, and much more powerful.  As a result of PTC's progress, NASA recently awarded PTC CREO as the software of the year for 2011, showing their great regards for the ability of these products and their ability to make life easier for the user.  PTC CREO wants all their customers to be as competitive as possible.


Overview of PTC
PTC was originally founded in 1985 by Samuel Peisakhovich Geisberg and is a United States based corporation.  PTC CREO is used by 27,000 companies worldwide.  One of their best customers being John Deere, which was coincidentally their first customer in 1988.  PTC’s products have developed over the years, changing due to technological advances.  They originally developed a version of a program named Pro/ENGINEER.   In 2011 PTC graduated to their new software, CREO Parametric 2.0.  PTC CREO has been the basis for many aspects of our lives from the John Deere or Case equipment that harvests our food to the commuter vehicles that we use every day. (wikipedia) 

So this leads us to the question: what makes CREO Parametric 2.0 superior to other modeling and drawing software that is out on the market at the moment, and why is this an improvement on it's predecessor, CREO Parametric 1.0?

Criteria 
I'm looking specifically for a product that will provide me with the quickest, easiest, most efficient way to design, model, assemble, and just 'engineer'.  

Improvements to Creo Parametric 
Introducing Creo Parametric 2.0 - PTC - The Changes

• Dynamic drag and free manipulation is one of 2.0’s new outstanding features. It allows you to drag the section plane throughout the model, there is no more need to struggle with datum planes or fail to find the view you are looking for.  
• Flexible Modeling Extension allows for part revision during assembly with no need to open the part, along with this it updates all aspects of the model to reflect part changes as they happen.
• Freestyle is easily one of the greatest improvements to our software, it is a feature unlike any on the market. It is incredibly intricate and is easily learned and adapted to, as shown in the following video
• Freestyle in Action in PTC Creo - PTC
• Although our product has new features and is better than ever, it is still the CREO software we have all learned to know and work with. Engineers with experience in CREO Parametric 1.0 or Pro/ENGINEER will easily adjust to the new system.  

Benefits over the Competition

Compared to ProENGINEER Wildfire 5.0, CREO parametric 2.0 has reduced mouse movement by 33% , mouse clicks by 18%, menu openings by 50% adding up to a overall 30% time savings in assemblies.  Additionally, large assembly loading has been increased by up to 40 times the previous speed.   Efficiency and time saving are essential traits to any corporation, and each of these benefits adds to less time for the engineer to effectively create the product, leading to a quicker design, which leads to a quicker manufacturing, and just a higher quality of product and process throughout the production process.  

In today's industry time is money, everyone wants their engineers to be as productive as possible. Giving them the right tools to do their job is essential

My assessment:
I would highly recommend this product to anyone entering the engineering field, regardless of knowledge level, and it meets all of my previously listed criteria.  

ME Ethics

Everything you do, see, or interact with has had an ethical dilemma somewhere in the process of it becoming a reality. It could be on where to place a road and might need to move someone’s family, building a car and deciding to use a cheaper inferior plastic or a stronger more expensive one, and even turning in a disgruntled employee who just got laid off from a competing company looking to sell secrets. You may not think of them and they may have even been settled in minutes on which one to go with but some can last through countless meetings, debates, and even arguments. Mechanical engineers are always facing these ethical dilemmas when designing products whether they are given free will over the project or have to get everything approved from the person watching the bottom line.

When designing the product we will know exactly what something can handle with stresses put on it and how long it can last from wear. If it were truly up to us and money was not an option we would have no problem using the best of the best materials with no ifs ands or buts about it. However that never gets to happen, almost always we are making a product for sale and we are always being pushed to make it the cheapest way possible so the company can make as much money as possible. The military is a good example of this situation, as they need to supply for a large quantity of soldiers and must do so in a high quality manner, with productive equipment that must also be cost-efficient. 

The easiest way to change the price on a product being produced is to change the material that it is built with. Some materials can cost many many times more per unit of that material but will be more reliable in every aspect. The cheaper inferior materials are able to save a lot of money for a company and allow them to reinvest in other projects. The more expensive materials can be a lot more reliable and smoother working but of course they could bankrupt a company. There needs to be a balance and the mechanical engineer is the person who needs to argue a middle ground.

Through all the calculations and experiments run an engineer also needs to account for a higher margin for safety as well. They need to be a very persuasive speaker and be able to convince the final decision maker to choose the product that they will feel good about producing and putting their name on it. In the end the product will almost always happen whether the engineer wins the argument, the producer wins, or they reach an acceptable middle ground. If the product is not produced to the quality that it needs and should be produced to bad things do happen. People have died over the years from bad products being used to create a final end product but the majority of products are up to par and last for a long time. As a future mechanical engineer this is an argument that I hope I never have to lose.

Explanation of my Field

Good evening! (Or morning, or afternoon, whichever it may be for you)  Hope it is just swell.

I'm a student going into Mechanical Engineering, and i'm here to chat with ya about that what that means, and what we do.  

Every day products and machines are overlooked and taken for granted in our daily lives, and we just use them without giving them a second thought.  If you were to out of the blue wonder, "where do these things come from? How are these thought up of and designed?", you would be led directly to our field.  Mechanical Engineers help with designwork and development of many fields, and help run this society and economy by making things work.  

Description

Mechanical engineering is the discipline of engineering that applies the principles of engineering, physics and materials science for analysis, design, manufacturing, and maintenance of mechanical systems. It is the branch of engineering that involves the production and usage of heat and mechanical power for the design, production, and operation of machines and tools. It is one of the oldest and broadest engineering disciplines. (wikipedia)  

What we do

Traditionally, Mechanical Engineering is  a trait that involves other corporations contacting an engineering firm, and asking for a specific design of a particular idea, part, or machine.  This can be started in many ways, including email, phone call, letter, or commonly conference call, which makes it easy to communicate every little detail throughout your group of engineers and with the entire contacting company.  The engineers will then draw a preliminary plan for designing the product.  Most likely using a modeling or designing software (ex. PRO-E, CREO, Solidworks...), we create a computer-generated model for every part needed for the product, applying our knowledge of mechanical properties and engineering qualities of said products.  Then, using the same technology or separate products, we combine the parts in an assembly that fits together nicely, and creates a properly functioning product.  After that, the engineer will test the product in a software, to understand the pressure and heat capabilities of the material.  Finally, after all parts are set, they will contact either the corporation or an allying manufacturing company and produce the part/assembly wanted.  

Values

Us Mechanical Engineers have values and standards that we stand by.  We strive for the highest level of precision when it comes to the smallest of details.  The smallest of errors in a dimension, and a part may be completely dysfunctional, and may harm the assembly as a whole, or harm the user of said product.  Also, having good people skills is crucial to us.  If we are rude to a customer, they will not want us designing their ideas.  Also, if we are not able to create a genuine bond with said contractees, and not be able to correctly communicate ideas, things will not get done.  

As I've hopefully communicated with you, Mechanical Engineers are vital components to our modern society, and offer innovation and the advancement to our daily lives.  We make things happen, and make a large portion of the world go round.  Thanks for reading!