Manufacturing Processes

The Manufacturing Processes class toured two facilities in the cities on April 30th. The two facilities were Medtronic and MTS. While MTS designs and builds very innovative, often one of a kind, test equipment, I was definitely more impressed with Medtronic. Medtronic is a, if not the, world leader in the manufacturing of medical devices. However, this was not what sets this company apart. What sets this company apart is its adherence to a mission statement since 1960 (really since the company formed in 1949):

To contribute to human welfare by application of biomedical engineering in the research, design, manufacture, and sale of instruments or appliances that alleviate pain, restore health, and extend life.

Medtronic is an ethically motivated organization that believes strongly in the value of citizenship:

Our corporate citizenship vision is twofold:

• to leverage our resources, assets, and expertise to catalyze dramatic improvement in the lives of those affected by chronic disease, and
• to operate responsibly in all facets where our business intersects with society.

Further, the work environment seemed structured but yet welcoming. The employees were friendly and all seemed to greet others with a smile. This is no small accomplishment for an organization, let alone such a large organization. The strength of an organization lies in the character of its employees. There was no lack of character at Medtronic. 

- Sue Benolken

Journey to the 2013 Shell Eco-marathon

In the spring of 2012, a group of Itasca Community College Students (ICC) embarked on a project to build a battery-electric powered Urban Concept car for the 2013 Shell Eco-marathon. An Urban Concept car differs from a Prototype in that it more accurately represents a production model car; it has headlights, taillights, turn signals, a windshield wiper, and even a trunk.

Fast forward to this past January, with some of those original students now at IRE, much work remained before the competition in early April. With the remaining design work left, the group of IRE and ICC students applied the knowledge and skills gained from their competencies to finish the car.

After 3 months of planning, designing, and building, an Urban Concept car was ready to hit the long road to Houston, Texas.

 

For more info: http://www.shell.com/global/environment-society/ecomarathon/about.html

Force Testing at the Mesabi Eveleth Campus

The Detroit Diesel design group was at the Mesabi Eveleth Campus conducting experiment testing. The experiment testing involved measuring the forces required to pull the top component off a Detroit Diesel electronic controller (shown below). The top of this component was pulled up by the overhead gantry crane. The force required to pull the top off this device was approximately 250 pounds. Knowing the force required to lift the top will help in later design considerations for removing the top.

We would like to give a special thanks to the professors at the Mesabi Eveleth Campus for being very helpful in our setup at the gantry crane and allowing us to use their facility.

J1 Project

In the first semester of our junior year (J1) is the Iron Range Engineering (IRE) lingo for the first project which all students participate in.  There are many projects to choose from, and each student decides for themselves which one is most interesting.  Dan Schmitz and I chose an ergonomic based project from a company out of Hibbing, MN named Design Manufacture and Remanufacture (DMR) owned by Detroit Diesel. 

One important thing that DMR does is repair the Detroit Diesel Electronic Control (DDEC) units which occasionally fail throughout the world.  Detroit Diesel engines are found in ships, trains, semi-trucks, and various other engine applications.  The DDEC unit is the computer brain box which experience tough conditions:  greasy, grimy, hot, wet, and salty environments.  When, for whatever reason, they fail, then DMR repairs them if they are at all in worthy condition to even be repaired.

DMR pries the tops off in order to expose the circuitry that is in need of repair.  The ergonomic issues that DMR is experiencing are due to employees repetitively removing these tops with screw drivers and pry bars.  Dan and I designed a system to use a hydraulic jack to remove the DDEC top.  Our Final Design Review (FDR) was today at IRE in front of the students and teachers; presenting a power point and demonstrating our prototype.

This project was a great learning experience and a lot of fun.  Tomorrow we have our client presentation at 2:00 pm.  Wish us luck and thanks for reading.

Jim McCluskey       

Machining with the new equipment

In the new manufacturing lab, the Flow waterjet machine has been used the most frequently by groups at IRE and also for outside projects.  The waterjet allows for precise cutting of various different materials with different thicknesses.  This precision is necessary when machining unique parts for different projects.  The first project that was cut out was for a student at Itasca Community College for his robot.  This robot had many different special cuts that would have been cumbersome to construct by hand.  Other personnel that have benefitted from the waterjet included: Mesabi Range baseball team, generation 6 DMR project, ICC Engineering Trophy, and WIKISPEED.

The WIKISPEED team used the waterjet to construct specialized motor mounts for their car.  These mounts needed to be cut out of aluminum and have the correct angles so the mounts could be welded in place in the proper place.  Below is a picture of the motor mount that was cutout on the waterjet and the bottom photo is the actual piece welded onto the car.  With this new machine the possibilities to construct prototypes with great accuracy will help in future learning at IRE.

Modeling at IRE

This device was cut from clear acrylic sheeting using IRE's CO2 laser cutter and bonded together using acetone. This was implemented in the Matrix Vasoconstrictor Team's project which is a continuation of the team's mentor, Les Flemming's doctoral dissertation. The small 1/8" silicone tubing was used as a micro-valve to direct hot and cold water to shape memory alloy wires which contract and extend when heated and cooled for use in robotics.

Our manufacturing capabilities at IRE have increased dramatically over the past few months. Since a large part of some projects involve modeling some type of system or prototype, it is very important to have this ability when performing a successful project or even a technical competency. A component of this involves having quality tools to perform these tasks, as well as usable spaces to create our designs.

Our modeling lab is designed for this purpose, and houses two major automated tools for manufacturing various devices. The laser cutter contains a high powered CO2 laser which is able to cut acrylic, wood, and thin metal. Designs are created using AutoCAD or Autodesk Inventor and downloaded to the laser cutter. For the robotics project I am currently part of, we created various working models which controlled fluid flow through an actuator system. The separate pieces of the model were cut from thin clear acrylic in the laser cutter and bonded together using acetone. This process worked very well and allowed for easy changes to the model when problems arose.

The second major piece of equipment installed in the modeling lab is the 3D plastic printer. After designing the part and downloading it to the printer, models are shaped from liquid plastic which cools after applied in the correct place. Different plastic model pieces have been created at IRE which have been implemented in various projects such as an automated digital camera holder which produces slow moving time lapse pictures.

The new manufacturing lab contains various milling and cutting equipment which have been installed over the past few months. A manual mill, automated mill, automated lathe, and a water jet machine are available for our use. This new equipment has allowed IRE to manufacture hardier steel or aluminum parts for various uses. Additionally various equipment such as plasma cutters, wire feed welders among others allows us to take parts cut from these machines and create working models.

Manufacturing Processes Tour

Yesterday, April 30^th, the students participating in the Manufacturing Processes competency went on a tour to Medtronic and MTS in order to see what they do and how they do it.

I thought that the visit to MTS was great because they not only design and manufacture testing systems, they design unique test systems based upon their customers’ requirements. There were tons of different machines and some big systems that they had built. It was a great experience to be able to walk up to them and see all of the different components coming together into a system and being able to understand how some of them work. 

Medtronic Tour

A number of students this semester are taking a competency called Manufacturing Processes with Bart Johnson.  As a part of this class, we study different methods of manufacturing different products.  We have studied plastics manufacturing, composite materials, one of a kind production, and clean room manufacturing.

After doing research on clean room manufacturing, we toured Medtronic yesterday, April 30th.  Medtronic utilizes clean room manufacturing for producing medical devices, and observing this first hand was beneficial for our understanding as a class.  Our tour was set up by a Gen 1 IRE graduate, Erin Lamke, who is now an engineer at Medtronic.  We were able to talk to a Manufacturing Engineer with the company, and ask many questions about their processes.  Overall, the tour was very beneficial for our learning, and for future employment considerations.