A student’s interdisciplinary product development project in engineering design education

DS 76: Proceedings of E&PDE 2013, the 15th International Conference on Engineering and Product Design Education, Dublin, Ireland, 05-06.09.2013

Year: 2013
Editor: John Lawlor, Ger Reilly, Robert Simpson, Michael Ring, Ahmed Kovacevic, Mark McGrath, William Ion, David Tormey, Erik Bohemia, Chris McMahon, Brian Parkinson
Author: Haack, Carsten; Lüthi, Ernst; Janssen, Volker
Series: E&PDE
Institution: Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Mechanical Engineering Department
Section: Projects
Page(s): 332-337
ISBN: 978-1-904670-42-1

Abstract

Within the bachelor education for different engineering programs a basic interdisciplinary product development project is the fundamental part of a three-level project-based education plan at Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts. The project teams consist of up to seven students from mechanical-, electrical-, business-engineering and computer science. All teams have the same inputs and tasks varying from year to year – usually with mechatronics background. During two semesters the teams learn in a practical, hands-on way the different aspects in today’s product development, such as: (customer) need finding – define – design/test – supply – produce – solution (product). The first semester is focusing on the need finding and definition phase, whereas the second semester is focusing on design loops including prototyping, test and supply. Students have to set-up all requirements and specifications for their individual solution, do the proof of concept and build up a functional prototype with a limited pre-defined budget. Another important aspect of this kind of engineering education is social networking and social aspects within the project framework. For validation a one-day competition is the final event of the engineering learning project. The basic teaching concept is presented. The advantages and limitations are discussed and explained with practical experiences from the last years and feedback from the participants, lecturers and the alumni network.

Keywords: Design education, interdisciplinary engineering projects, active learning

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