(Wave) Guiding EE’s Out Of The Capstone Box

C. Compeau; Austin Talley

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Conference: 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Minneapolis, MN
Publication Date: August 23, 2022
Start Date: June 26, 2022
End Date: June 29, 2022
Conference Session: DEED Technical Session 3 Capstone Design
Page Count: 14
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--41042
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/41042
Download Count: 455

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Paper Authors

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Austin Talley Texas State University

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Dr. Austin Talley is an Assistant Professor of Practice in the Ingram School of Engineering at Texas State University. Prior to joining the faculty at Texas State University, Dr. Austin Talley worked as a manufacturing quality engineer for a test and measurement company, National Instruments, in Austin, TX. Dr. Austin Talley is a licensed by state of Texas as a Professional Engineer. Both of Dr. Austin Talley’s graduate degrees, a doctorate and masters in Mechanical Engineering, manufacturing and design area, are from the University of Texas at Austin. Additionally, Dr. Austin Talley holds an undergraduate degree from Texas A&M University in Mechanical Engineering. His research is in engineering design theory and engineering education. He has published over 30 papers in engineering education journals
and conference proceedings. He has worked to implement multiple National Science Foundation (NSF) grants focused on engineering education. He has been an instructor in more than ten week long summer K-12 teach Professional Development Institutes (PDI). He has received multiple teaching awards. He has developed design based curriculum for multiple K-12 teach PDIs and student summer camps.

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C. Compeau Texas State University

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Abstract

Electrical Engineering (EE) capstone students at Texas State University have typically undertaken projects focused on traditional electrical engineering activities such as robotics competitions, the implementation of embedded systems, and the development of analog circuits. Many of our EE projects have limited scope outside their traditional EE realms, such as small 3D printed enclosures for their projects that are often fabricated towards the end of the capstone course. This results in our students focusing on one small part of what would be a much larger development effort in industry. This narrow focus causes students to miss out on how other facets of an engineering project influence their work, and vice versa. To provide a broader and more realistic engineering experience we defined this 3D printed waveguide project with the requirement of diverse development tasks integral to the project that had to be addressed early in the course. Two project teams of four students each were tasked with designing, producing, and characterizing a minimum of six 3D printed functional waveguide components (coax adapter, waveguide, horn antenna) with an overall cost no greater than 20% of an off the shelf component. WR90 waveguides (8.2 – 12.4GHz) were selected because we had components on hand in our research labs for purposes of quantitative performance comparison. To demonstrate project completion, each team will use their coax adapter, waveguide, and horn antenna to transmit a low intensity 10GHz test signal across the room at our Senior Design Day. This project embodies several diverse and concurrent engineering tasks such as CAD for the 3D prints, HFSS radiation pattern simulations, electroplating copper onto PETG, measuring plating thickness and resistivity at our Shared Research Operations facility, machining small copper electrodes in our Makerspace, using a vector network analyzer to measure performance, interfacing with an antenna characterization service, and providing process descriptions and performance data for this paper. We will look at when and how many times the EE’s on this project utilized the Makerspace as compared to other traditional EE projects in the control group, and their design self-perception via administration of the Measuring Engineering Design Self-Efficacy survey. Fabrication and performance details such as insights into electroplating, characterized waveguide VSWR and insertion loss, and horn antenna radiation pattern as simulated vs. measured will also be stated.

Citation
Format

Talley, A., & Compeau, C. (2022, August), (Wave) Guiding EE’s Out Of The Capstone Box Paper presented at 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Minneapolis, MN. 10.18260/1-2--41042

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - Electrical Engineering (EE) capstone students at Texas State University have typically undertaken projects focused on traditional electrical engineering activities such as robotics competitions, the implementation of embedded systems, and the development of analog circuits. Many of our EE projects have limited scope outside their traditional EE realms, such as small 3D printed enclosures for their projects that are often fabricated towards the end of the capstone course. This results in our students focusing on one small part of what would be a much larger development effort in industry. This narrow focus causes students to miss out on how other facets of an engineering project influence their work, and vice versa.   To provide a broader and more realistic engineering experience we defined this 3D printed waveguide project with the requirement of diverse development tasks integral to the project that had to be addressed early in the course. Two project teams of four students each were tasked with designing, producing, and characterizing a minimum of six 3D printed functional waveguide components (coax adapter, waveguide, horn antenna) with an overall cost no greater than 20% of an off the shelf component. WR90 waveguides (8.2 – 12.4GHz) were selected because we had components on hand in our research labs for purposes of quantitative performance comparison. To demonstrate project completion, each team will use their coax adapter, waveguide, and horn antenna to transmit a low intensity 10GHz test signal across the room at our Senior Design Day.  This project embodies several diverse and concurrent engineering tasks such as CAD for the 3D prints, HFSS radiation pattern simulations, electroplating copper onto PETG, measuring plating thickness and resistivity at our Shared Research Operations facility, machining small copper electrodes in our Makerspace, using a vector network analyzer to measure performance, interfacing with an antenna characterization service, and providing process descriptions and performance data for this paper.  We will look at when and how many times the EE’s on this project utilized the Makerspace as compared to other traditional EE projects in the control group, and their design self-perception via administration of the Measuring Engineering Design Self-Efficacy survey.  Fabrication and performance details such as insights into electroplating, characterized waveguide VSWR and insertion loss, and horn antenna radiation pattern as simulated vs. measured will also be stated. 
AU  - Austin Talley
AU  - C. Compeau
CY  - Minneapolis, MN
DA  - 2022/08/23
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - (Wave) Guiding EE’s Out Of The Capstone Box
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/41042
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--41042
ER  -