Minnesota Power and design reviews

Today Richie and I went to Minnesota Power in Cohasset. Here we had a meeting about one of our projects. The project is about improving condenser performance on Unit #4 condenser. Here we had a discussion on many different options that we can peruse.
The rest of the group stayed back at IRE. Some had design reviews to do, while others had project work to complete. The big thing for today is the grading scale that was proposed to us by the faculty. Although it is still in draft form, it is a step in the right direction to get a final grading scale.

Proofed by: Cory

IRE Advisory Board Meeting

Sunday night the advisory board members flew into Duluth and were picked up by a couple of our students in the school suburbans. The advisory members were from Texas A&M, MNSU Mankato, Penn State, Washington State, and State Thomas University. They had meetings with Ron, Dan, and Sue Collins. They also met with each of our design teams to learn about our projects. They let us explain our design process and learning process and the details of our projects. They gave us insight on what to look for in the future and asked what we have learned in passed events at IRE. We also went out to eat with them at the Virginia Golf Course on MMonday night.
During their meetings with Ron and Dan. they discussed and edited the new IRE grading rubric, which was presented to us this afternoon.It consists of 52 compiled cometencies, with three tiers of competence, with six levels of ability.

Skills and Knowledge Competition at MRCTC

MRCTC puts on an annual knowledge and skills competition for the area high schools where juniors and seniors get to compete in multiple areas—math, English, welding, and engineering among others. Moe Benda, Director of Iron Range/UMD Graduate Engineering Education Program, came in yesterday morning asking us to help with the engineering event. Yes, we have a lot of project work to do and are quite busy, but we always have time to help open the eyes of youngsters to engineering.

The project (building a small wind turbine) is designed to be a competition, but it will be a great learning experience for the high school students, as well as for us. We, as guides and coaches, will need to have an in-depth understanding of the process to generate electricity using the energy of the wind and the functionality of all the components. Taking on this project adds to our list of things to do, but it will be a fun volunteer activity and something different from our typical day.

Proofed By: Tyler Bartek

Grand Canyon

Wednesday morning, we used our engineering brainpower to strategically pack the suburbans for one last time. We departed from Vegas, with the Grand Canyon overlook as a waypoint in our trusty Garmin GPS's, around 9:00 AM. By this point in our trip, everyone had found the most comfortable places to lie their head, so the five hour drive was nothing to lose sleep over.

I think I can speak for everyone when I say we were awestruck. It was such a view that at times it almost looks fake. I think it pushed Christy's acrophobia (fear of heights) to the max, but even she couldn't leave without peering over the edge. It is truly one of nature's greatest achievements.

We had seen many man made structures from the Hoover Dam, Golden Gate Bridge, to the glowing buildings of Vegas, but the Grand Canyon proved that mother nature still has the upper hand. Usually when we see such a large hole in the ground, it is adjacent to a crushing/grinding mill. Roth and I looked hard, but there were no mining trucks, only the Colorado river slowly eroding away yet another layer of the earth. The Grand Canyon is definitely a must see for anyone and everyone. It was a nice close to our amazing spring break trip.

Proofed by: Barb Moran

San Diego - U.S.S. Midway

Yesterday in San Diego we toured the U.S.S. Midway one of the U.S. Navy's retired aircraft carriers. The ship was an impressive Engineering feat. It originally was designed as a a battle ship but was converted to an aircraft carrier because they were more effective in fighting battles. The ship was powered by steam using a both a high and low pressure turbine. Although both of the turbines spun at different RPMs, 4850 and 4500 respectively, and each had their own drive shaft they were able to be combined into one drive shaft for the propeller at a lower RPM using a complex gear box. The turbines could also be stopped and ran backwards for reverse. The aircrafts on the top deck also used a steam thrust to help them launch off of the carrier in the short distance provided. The planes would reach over 140 miles per hour in less than the length of a football field. Usually launching was done into the wind to assist in take off by creating lift on the wings. A few of us spoke to one of the veterans working on the ship. He told us that everyone had their own area on the deck that they were required to remain in. The average age on the flight deck was 18 years old, this was skewed by those that snuck into the Navy at even younger ages. He said that he had a lot of respect for them because of all that could have been going on at one time around them, stating that it was usually so loud you could hardly hear yourself think. They also had many of the aircraft that served on the Midway throughout the years. All of them had their own design that made them effective in the missions called for, some of them were built for speed others for maneuverability and they all contained a ton of gauges and electronics. The ship had a cafe and gift shop and was laid out in a way that you could pick and choose what areas you wanted to spend time at. The tour was a great learning experience from both an engineering and tourist perspective.

Proofed by Erin

HOOVER DAM

Tuesday, March 23, 2010 – Hoover Dam

Bright and early this morning, we departed from the city that never sleeps to drive the 30 min trip to the Nevada - Arizona border to see the engineering marvel of the Hoover Dam on the Colorado River. After two security checkpoints, we were inside the visitor’s center and meeting with our tour guide Leslie.

Leslie took us on what was called the VIP tour, requiring hardhats and allowing access to restricted parts of the Dam not open to the general public. We took an elevator down to the Nevada side of the turbine floor 550 feet below the top of the dam. After a short walk, we crossed the border and started the turbine floor tour on the Arizona side. The dam has a total of 17 generating units, 9 on the Arizona side and 8 on the Nevada side. The total power capacity generated from the 17 units is 2080 megawatts. An interesting thing is that they only run up to 30 % capacity as regulating water level dictates the power output rather that producing the maximum power. Each turbine is over seven stories tall with the water hitting each turbine blade at over 60 mph.

After seeing the maintenance area for working on the turbines, we moved on to one of the connection tunnels bored to meet up with the bypass tunnels used to divert the Colorado River during the construction. Once inside we could see how the 50-foot diameter tunnels had been retrofitted with 30-foot diameter pipes that would decrease in size down to 4-foot diameter used to direct the water into the turbines.

After leaving the tunnels, we walked along the outside of the power generation area, saw the large transformers, and cantilevered overhead lines ascending the canyon walls. After a quick walkthrough of a ventilation tunnel where we could look out of the dam halfway up the side we took the elevator up to the top of the dam and walked back across the border to the visitors center where we had begin.

Quick facts about Hoover Dam
Construction began 1931 – finished 1935.
Financed entirely through the sale of hydroelectric power.
Provides water for areas of Nevada, Arizona, and California.
The Dam
• Max Height: 726 feet
• Crest Length: 1244 feet
• Crest Width: 45 feet
• Base Width: 660 feet
• Volume of Concrete: 3.25 million cubic yards

The Powerplant
• Number of Units: 17
• Capacity: 2080 Megawatts
• Length: 650 feet
• Width: 55 feet
• Height: 75 feet

Pictures will be posted in the gallery

Proofed by Erin

SAN DIEGO ZOO

San Diego Zoo

On our Spring Break road trip, the next stop after San Francisco was San Diego. Saturday morning we had the luxury of being able to go to the San Diego Zoo. This was definitely our highlight in San Diego and we had great weather all morning. The Zoo was amazing and contained everything from tour and attractions, animal encounters, shows, dining and shopping. This Zoo covered over 100 acres and had many opportunities for people of all ages.

When entering the Zoo we were welcomed by the first exhibits that were in the Lost Forest. This exhibit housed flamingos, peacocks, and many other birds. When following the trail through the lost forest, there were tigers, hippos, monkeys, gorillas, alligators, and many more. The other exhibits were the Discovery Outpost, Polar Rim, Panda Canyon, Asian Passage, Elephant Odyssey, Africa Rocks, Urban Jungle, and Outback.

The Zoo was laid out very well for tourists to find their way around to which exhibits they would like to see. There were also a few other choices we had for tours in the park to learn more about the animals and get around faster. The first one was the tour buses. The Zoo’s tour bus included a 35 minute tour that covered 70 percent of the Zoo. There were 5 different spots along the park where you could hop on and off of the bus. There was also a SkyFari Aerial Tram. This was transportation over the treetops from one side of the zoo to the other. This had a spectacular view, and you could see the whole park and where certain animals were, as you slid across the sky. This had two terminals, the East and West where you could exit or enter. Luckily for us we had unlimited access to both of these for the whole day.

Also, every day at the zoo they have daily features. About every hour they had a different show including presentations you could attend. As we walked by the Giraffe exhibit we could see that there was Giraffe Feeding going on, which looked amazing. Unfortunately, I did not do this and only took pictures because the line extended on past the exhibit. But being able to see the animals interacting with all the people were really cool. Another exhibit that seemed to have a line all day was of the Pandas. Everyone also seems to have a soft spot for these little cute fuzzy animals. The only thing we as a group were a little upset about was that the polar bear exhibit was being worked on was not reopening until the 26th. We knew there were 3 bears in the exhibit, but the whole thing was netted off and we could not see inside.

All in all the Zoo was awesome!!

Proofed by: Alexander Learmont

Pacific Coast Highway

The coast of California in one word: amazing. There hasn't been an experience in my 21 years that could match the drive along the Pacific Coast Highway... Mountains, ocean, sunset, wildlife, waterfalls... Oh yeah, and driving it with the top down in a Jeep Wrangler.

Yesterday (March 20th), Ron, Andrew, Richie, and I took off from San Francisco on what we anticipated would be a 12 hour car ride down the coast of California on Hwy 1. The first stop was about two hours into the trip in Santa Cruz, CA, and we thought what would be better than driving through the town to look at the Pacific? As we pulled up, the beach was semi-populated with a few die hard surfers trying to catch the morning waves, and at the end of this beach, was an outcropping of rocks with a lighthouse standing strong against the wind and the waves. Of course, there was the 'click' of the camera, and as fast as we drove in, we drove out.

The weather was starting to warm up, and what better way to soak up spring break weather than stopping at a beach? This led us to stop at Moss Landing State Beach, which was right off of the highway. As we drove in, on a little bridge across an inlet several cars were parked. So, being tourists, we also had to stop to look at whatever everyone else was staring at. In the water was a HUGE otter, and he (or she) was flailing around madly. After several minutes of debate, we concluded that the otter was trying to break open either a clam or oyster to get some food. The otter had placed a rock on his/her belly and was smashing the clam against it in hopes of some grub. (See video at the end of blog)

On up the beach we went, parked the car, and took our shoes off to walk in to warm sand. Only a few things are better than the ocean breeze blowing on my face and the warm sand beneath my feet!

After the beach, we kicked the traveling into high gear… at least for a little while. The views that came with the Pacific Coast Highway were stunning and, at times, a little high up for my liking. Nevertheless, seeing the cliff faces, jagged rocks, and watching the ocean unmercifully pound them again and again with its powerful waves is something I will always take with me. This scene happened all across Hwy 1 along with stretches of road that drove inland to the little towns that were scattered along the California coast. There was one such place called Big Sur, and at a little hole in the wall burrito restaurant/general store, we stopped to have an amazing lunch of burritos and jalapeno chips. At this point, we decided that it was warm enough to bring the top of the ‘09 Wrangler down. How many engineers does it take to take the top off??? Better left unsaid… Anyway, we were back on the road with the wind blowing in our faces, and unfortunately, so was my hair. A couple minutes and a ponytail later, all four of us were jamming out to our favorite songs not caring about anything, but the beauty of the road ahead. Which so happened to give us more vistas, and even a waterfall.

Meanwhile, the ocean had created a dense cloud of fog and coldness. As we drove down the coast, we could see a vast wall of darkness that kept creeping closer until the Wrangler and all four of its passengers drove bravely into it with the top still down. Okay, I’m not going to lie, it got to be pretty cold. In our stubborn attempt to keep the top down and stay warm, we put on more layers and cranked the heat. However, our efforts were futile, and a couple more miles down the road, we pulled over and reluctantly, put the top back up.

To me, one of the best parts of the drive was seeing animals in their natural environment, especially when they are animals I don’t normally get to observe. Personally, seeing one sea lion would have been cool, so seeing 65 at once was awesome. As we were driving along the road we had come to an area that was low tide with sand poking up from under the ocean water. On this sand were 65 sea lions and a crowd of people watching them. Naturally, we pulled the Wrangler around to once again act like the tourists we were and stare at these creatures. Andrew decided he wanted a closer look, so out of the Jeep he went and strolled through the fence and across the field to where the rest of the people were standing. Here is where he snapped a couple photos as the sea lions slept and scooted across the sand on their belly which is, by the way, quite a hysterical sight. Back through the fence and into the open door Andrew came after a couple more pictures of some sea lions in the water, and once more, we were off.

Sadly, the daylight had to end sometime. As we were driving through the city of Ventura, the sun decided to kiss the crests of the ocean wave’s goodnight and slowly drift out of sight in the distant horizon. Here, we stopped to get our supper of subs and chips. In a half an hour, we climbed back into the Wrangler, only this time, the interstate was our destination and not the splendor of the Pacific Coast Highway. At eleven o’clock pacific time, we rolled into the Holiday Inn Bayside in San Diego, CA, top still up on the Wrangler, ready for rest and relaxation so that we could be rejuvenated for our next adventure…

P.S. Somehow, the drive time of 12 hours was actually 14. What a day.

Proofed by Ron

IRE in San Francisco

IRE came down from northern California to San Francisco on Thursday. It was a 350 mile trip down the Pacific Coast. The drive was beautiful. The scenic route took us through the mountains of Northern California. Along the way, we came upon an even more scenic route. We took the route known as the Avenue of the Giants. This lead us through the Giant Redwood Trees. The trees were enormous! Some of the trees that we saw were around 5000 years old. Along the way, we stopped at a site that let us drive through a Giant Redwood. I was the lucky one driving, and I managed to squeeze the suburban through with less than an inch to spare.

As we approached San Francisco we were met by an awesome view - The Golden Gate Bridge. As we crossed this famous engineering marvel, we could look to our right and see miles out to the Pacific Ocean, and we could look to our left and see the city of San Francisco. Also to the left was Alcatraz, which is located in the center of San Francisco Bay. The view all around was awesome.

Friday was a busy day in the city. To start off the day we went to the California Academy of Science. Here we saw many interesting displays. A majority of the displays had to do with environmental themes. In the center of the building there were two giant glass spheres with circular windows in the top to let in sunlight. In one of the spheres was a rain forest. As we entered, the atmosphere became very humid. The entrance was on the floor of the rain forest. As we walked around in the sphere, the stairs led us through the madagascar, and then up to the canopy. There were birds, butterflies, and all sorts of other creatures in this exhibit. After the trek up, we took the elevator down beneath to see an aquarium of tropical fish. The second sphere was the planetarium, but I didn't go see it because Christy and I got tickets to see King Tut's exhibit at the DeYoung's Museum across the street.

Christy and I took a cab back to the hotel after we left the museum. This cab ride turned out to be a miniature tour and history lesson of San Francisco. The cab driver showed us the famous view of the Old Ladies. This view is a street that has very brightly colored Victorian houses(which are the old ladies), and in the background, you can see out over the rest of San Francisco. Then, the cab driver took us by the house that Mrs. Doubtfire was filmed. After that, we went by the city hall, and we got a history lesson on the hall and it led into a discussion about the 1906 earthquake. We were almost to the hotel when the driver asked if we had ever been down Lombard Street. Which, of course, we hadn't so he took us a few blocks out of our way to go down it. Lombard Street is considered the crookedest street in the world. It winds up a hill in San Francisco that has beautiful houses lining it. The driver also told us that the people that live on the street take pride in it because they do all the gardening themselves.

The afternoon portion of the day was spent down at the Fisherman's Wharf. The wharf has a bunch of little shops and cool places to eat. Pier 39 was the most popular of the places on the wharf. At the end of the pier we got to see sea lions. They came in and sat on the docks. It was pretty cool.

One of the shops we stopped at was called the Pearl Factory. At the Pearl Factory you get to pick out an oyster from a bucket, and then, with the pearl that is inside, you can get a necklace or ring made. The whole experience was pretty cool because they make you do a Hawaiian ritual, and then, they took you through the whole process of cleaning and setting the pearl.


Overall, it was an exciting and eventful stay in San Francisco. I forgot to mention that the weather was seventy and sunny while we were there. But all good things come to and end, and it's off to San Diego to continue our adventure.

Proofed by Christy

Mankato to Crescent City (3100 miles!)

Our days have been busy lately, filled with fun and driving and other random adventures. It's been difficult to blog every day. So...here's a recap of our trip up until now. First, our group of students left Virginia (Tuesday, March 9, 2010) to head to Mankato for a three day crash course in Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing.

Right after our class on Friday, we headed out to Rapid City, South Dakota; a long drive and quick stop. Then, it was off in the morning for another day of driving, bunking down for the night in Missoula, Montana. Between these two cities, we stopped at Mount Rushmore and did some driving through the beautiful mountains.

After Missoula, we headed to Seattle. Seattle was a fun city. Andrew previously stated that we went whitewater rafting and go karting. We explored the city a little bit and found Kerry Park, which is an overlook of the city. We also found Counterbalance Park. This was just a little corner in the city, filled with lights and a story about a trolley in the city. This was at the bottom of a hill. The trolley was hooked to a counterbalance weight. The weight was released and came down the hill when the trolley needed to get to the top of the hill. The morning before we left Seattle, we all visited the Fish Market in downtown Seattle. This was a very interesting little part of town filled with produce shops, fresh fish shops, book stores, cafes and restaurants. It was a lot of fun.

From Seattle, we traveled down to Astoria for a night. We enjoyed a dinner at the Silver Salmon, took a trip over the Astoria Bridge, visited the house the Goonies was filmed at, the Astoria Column, and Fort Stevens.

Proofed by: Andrew

Rafting and Go Carts in Seattle

Today was awesome. We started the day off with a scenic drive to northern Washington. We got an excellent view of several mountains and the Snohomish River. Then we went river rafting down class 4 rapids. We had three great guides who got us all down the river safely, and made sure we had a blast. The water temperature was 35 degrees and this was their first run of the season. At a few points our guide, Craig, had us spinning down the river like a top. Because it is early in the season, the water level is low, which makes it a slightly slower but much more technical trip. It was hard and required a lot of teamwork, but it was an amazing experience.

After this we had a few hours of downtime, where several of us went walking and driving around Seattle. After everyone met back up, we went go-cart racing. The competition consisted of a practice round, a qualifying race, and a final race. The practice round was a 12 lap race to get familiar with the track, Roth and Austin had the best times. For the qualifying round we went 14 laps, our best lap time was used to arrange us in two groups of 6, from fastest to slowest. We started the final round in order of our best lap time, but the winner was the first one to cross the finish line. I had the second position in my heat; I passed Alex in the first lap and lapped Richie by the end, to win the first place medal. Today was incredibly fun, and it will be hard to top, but will do it.

Proofed by Roth

Mankato Class

Today was the first day of our Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing (GDT) class in Mankato. The class is for eight hours not including homework and goes on the next two ,days. Today, we got a an introduction into GDT, and tomorrow, we will improve on what we have already learned. One big thing we learned was how to dimension parts using a machine called a Coordinate Measurement Machine (CMM). This machine allows you to measure parts in three axises (x,y,z). To calculate surface tolerances the probe of the machine is touched multiple points on a part in a certaint order. When the sensor touches the part it records the position of the sensor. Then the data is sent to the computer where it builds the part in the computer from the points you gathered off your part. After you are done you can see your the part on the computer with dimensions.

proofed by: Austin and Alex

Spring Break Update

Today started off our spring break vacation. We hit the road, headed toward Mankato, where we will take our GD&T class for three days before the real vacation starts. On the way here we stopped at Green Mill and ate dinner with 5 prospective students with whom we interacted and informed of the technical side of IRE.
After the next three days of our class here in Mankato we will set out towards the west coast.
I have decided that I will post pictures of town water towers or signs along the way to show where we have been.
Today, on our way south, we made a stop in Grand Rapids, MN.

Out of the Office Events

Here at IRE, we reward and get rewarded for hard work and diligence. There are various activities that are available for us to participate in if we so choose--one of them being curling. Last night was the third time this year we got to go out and learn something different than most of us are used to. With the help of some generous members of the Curl Mesabi Curling Club, we were able to go from hardly being able to walk on the ice with a slider, on to hitting our targets and having some competitive games.

Getting out of the office and the apartments like this makes for a good breakup of our typical day. It also is good because it provides us an opportunity to interact with people and groups of individuals that we wouldn't typically socialize with. This provides IRE students the opportunity to better our people skills--developing us as professionals and individuals while having fun.

Proofed By: Tyler, Austin, and Alex

Learning Plan

What exactly is a Learning Plan? What should it include?

To answer this question takes a little background. If you consider the last two years of an engineering degree, the knowledge and skills a student learns can be broken into some unit. For example, a student might be expected to learn 1/4th of their competencies in a semester, if they have four semesters in their last two years.

At IRE our unit is a project. If a student does x projects in their time at IRE, then each project should represent 1/x of their learning. Right now we are in the process of making visible to the students what 100% of their learning should look like. To do this we have identified all of the technical knowledge and professional competencies that they should acquire/attain. To quantify this we use "arrows" to represent a continuum from 1-10. A continuum from novice to expert. We use Bloom's Taxonomy to show low level learning at 1 and high level synthesis/evaluation at 10. We consider that "work-ready" should equate to a 6 which is higher level analysis. Our expectation is that an IRE graduate will attain a 6 or higher in the vast majority of the nearly 100 "arrows".

As the students prepare a work-plan to describe how they will meet the clients needs for a project, they are also preparing a learning-plan to show what learning they will need to do during the project cycle. This learning plan should account for 1/x of their IRE learning. Included in the learning plan:

• What technical and professional competencies are being addressed?
• What is the student's individual starting level in that competency?
• What is the student's target level for the end of the cycle?
• What learning activities will be used to empower the student to achieve this new level? In other words what resources are needed - faculty, external expert, peer, research, self learning.
• What assessments will be employed to guide the learning?
• What are the different kinds of evidence that will demonstrate that the learning has been achieved?

This process must be interactive with our faculty so that students can get assistance in planning and in identifying potential resources as well as what things don't the students know that they don't know (unknown unknowns).

Right now we are in J1. The first industry project in the junior year. The learning plans are being developed in conjunction with the design work plans.

Power Trowel Solution Application

Austin and myself were assigned to work on the power trowel project. Yesterday we met with our client who was kind enough to lend us a small power trowel to use in the design process along with a sample of the solution we will be using to get a good understanding of its characteristics. We have a few different ideas we plan to explore to make the project a success. We are planning to make the system as low maintenance as possible, so we are trying to avoid using batteries that will run down quickly. Instead, we are trying to create a charging system for the batteries using the power trowel's engine. It has already become apparent to us that we may be able to take our design to the Minnesota Cup competition.

Proofed by: Cory Moran

New Projects

Last week we received our new projects. They encompass a wide array of the engineering profession, including mechanical, electrical, and biomedical engineering. Monday, my group and I met with a local business owner to discuss the requirements for our project. We told him of the three main ideas we had come up with during the previous few days. He was excited by all of them and encouraged us to explore all three. We spent the majority of today investigating the feasibility of our initial design. We quickly modeled it using Pro-E, a three dimensional modeling software. We were able to animate our design to see how different size linkages, crankshafts, and pedals would affect the way the whole system worked.

Proofed by: Tyler Bartek

Welding Lab

On Friday, everyone spent the day at the Mesabi Range Eveleth campus. We were split up into two groups, the first group included the members of the raft cart group, the second included members of the sauna group and Blandin group. As a member of the first group, we spent the first hour having the welding instructor Tom Baldwin show us how to wire feed weld aluminum alloy 6061. After showing us both push and pull techniques each member made quite a few practice beads. After each member got the basics down, we began fabricating the cart. Within a 4 hour period, the cart went from a stack of drawings and a pile of tubing and parts, to an almost fully completed product that requires only an couple additions by this Friday. During the raft cart fabrication time, the other group of students learned how to wire feed weld steel. This Friday, the groups will switch so all students will learn the same techniques.