2022 Engineering Design Expo

Create a backpack chair to support the challenger/customer during long periods of walking or standing. The customer has Limb-Girdle Muscular Dystrophy, which causes progressive weakness in their limbs. This has resulted in difficulty walking and standing up from normal seating without support. The customer wants a chair which he can carry in a backpack which deploys without removal of the backpack, with little to no set up steps and is bar stool height so he can use it without external assistance. The chair's purpose is to provide a seat for occasional use in city and urban environments.

Members: Lucas Harmon, Christian Schafer, Graeme Basey and Hailey Dunham

The purpose of the project is to create a trainer for the Watchman atrial occlusion procedure for Parkview Health. This procedure helps to minimize the risk of blood clots forming that eventually cause strokes in patients with atrial fibrillation. Currently, there are some digital trainers which offer little customization of the procedure as well as physical trainers that can cost upwards of $20,000. The team used 3D modeling software to edit hearts to fit the apparatus and an Arduino driven pump system able to create pulsatile flow.

Members: Jayden Pothoof, Elijah Swingly and Noah Bildner

The purpose of this project is to create a device to awaken veterans who are experiencing PTSD nightmares. These nightmares frequently and often impact their quality of life due to their bodies' traumatic reactions and responses. This device will detect a nightmare, confirm the input is a nightmare and complete an output that will reach different thresholds. The thresholds will start small and slowly gain until the system registers another input that the terror has ceased and the patient is either awake or sleeping peacefully.

Members: Mia Schlueter, Angela Pokharel, Jack Van Buren and Kelsie Kimbrogh

The Adaptive Cycling Shoes research team develop a pair of shoes and bicycle pedals to allow for a former Army Captain to compete in road cycling events after sustaining lower limb injuries. The design plan to promote pain-free cycling included HOKA running shoe bases with innovative BOA fit tightening mechanisms, water and chemical-proofing, formulated orthotics from professional-grade materials (PG) and transplanted cycling shoe soles which incorporated ferrous metal plates to permit interface with neodymium-magnet-containing pedals and 3D-printed componentry. Testing protocols were developed and utilized to ensure pedals and shoes met industry standards.

Members: Christa Buehler, Natalee Kunse, Ashley Spirrison and Bailey Thompson

Precision Medical Industries (PMI) has requested that we create a disposable torque wrench composed of injection molded plastics to decrease the manufacturing costs, improve patient safety and target a lower range of torque values. In order to accomplish this, the group performed multiple design iterations using SolidWorks and creating three primary testing protocols. To aid in PMIs manufacturing, the group also created a manufacturing plan with all required equipment recommendations and a cost benefit analysis.

Members: Payton Nickoli, Gabrielle Hamilton, Troy Bosse and Theodore Samra

The kayak assist group was tasked with helping a Marine Corps veteran who enjoys kayaking. His kayaking routine was difficult and caused excess stress on his shoulders and lower back. This project designed a new system that is safer and more efficient for the veteran. The new system consists of three subsystems corresponding to the three major issues the veteran faces when kayaking: loading and unloading the kayak from the truck, transporting the kayak to and from the water, and getting in and out of the kayak in the water.

Members: Madison Howard, Kortney Helm and Connor Moon

When fermenting beer, the presence of oxygen compromises the flavor of the beer so the fermenting tank must be purged of oxygen with carbon dioxide. We were tasked by Chapman's Brewery to minimize the amount of carbon dioxide they are using to purge oxygen from their fermenting tank before adding beer and to determine a measurable and more efficient purging solution. This project involved background research on the brewing process, oxygen effects on beer and purging theory; as well as solutions to these problems. Different oxygen sensors and alternative solutions were researched to find the best fit for the needs of the company.

Members: Alec Wallisch, Colleen Gillmann and David Keptner

A 3-Fluid plate and frame heat exchanger uses cooling water to reduce the exiting temperature of air and oil from a compressor. The cooling water causes fouling within the heat exchanger which reduces the heat transfer capability. When the heat transfer gets too low, the exchanger requires chemical cleaning. The cleaning process requires an outside company to clean due to the welded structure of the heat exchanger. Replacement of these exchangers is required when the cleaning is no longer effective. The purpose of this project is to replace the exchanger with a more cost-effective system.

Members: Alec Parr, Nasir Al Mutlaq and Robert Webb

At Abbott Nutrition's plant in Sturgis, Michigan, hard well water goes through traditional treatment steps before being fed to boilers and eventually incorporated into products. To bring their boiler feed water treatment system to the state of the art system that produces water conductivity under four micro-Siemen, a reverse osmosis (RO) system was designed. This design will produce supply over 180,000 pounds per hour.

Members: Ahdrin Bordner, Erika Kendall, Noah McClellan, Nolan Oleski and Sherrie Riser

Members: Luis Vivanco, Patrick Loeffler and Tristen Ortiz

The main goal for this project was to determine the efficiency of pasteurizing beer for Chapman's Brewing Company in Angola, Indiana. They have had previous issues with cans exploding in transit to stores because of the continued growth of yeast after canning.

Members: Adam Dills, Brandon Sill and Quin Fauquher

POET Bioprocessing, the state-of-the-art ethanol production facility, will consume approximately 28 million bushels of locally-grown corn to produce 80 million gallons of ethanol annually. Tasked with evaluating the effectiveness of the current placement of a plate and frame heat exchanger. The heat exchanger is meant to aid the cooling water tower in the summer months when it is unable to meet cooling requirements.

Members: Abdullah Alhosawi, Andrew Cheney and Jacob Dougherty

The purpose of this project was to design a novel solvent transfer system to replace an existing process at the Pfizer Kalamazoo plant. The solvents being transferred are isopropyl alcohol (IPA) and ethanol. The current process involves the transfer of 350-gallon chemical totes that contain the solvents and waste in a congested area, which poses safety, ergonomic and logistical issues.

Members: Jonah Blanchard, Chris Sanchez, Carli Tate and Laura Weller

Members: Blaine Harvey and Meghan McGonagle

In August 2021, the TDA company was introduced to the project of a potential water main extension stretching from the existing water tank on 450 W CR 300N to Pokagon State Park. The project was first introduced by Tom Selman (Angola Water Superintendent) and Amanda Cope (Angola's City Engineer). The goal of this extension is to supply water to Pokagon State Park, so they do not have to keep using their own water system, while also providing the adequate amount of chlorine.

Members: Trenton Heh, Arizona Lenski and Drew Parsley

The City of Angola's water main currently stops at the city's northern water tank on County Road 300N. With a recent grant from the federal government, the city wants to extend the water main to Pokagon State Park. The City of Angola plans for further expansion to the north in the future including new subdivisions. This extension will provide service to the Potawatomi Inn and the campgrounds at the state park and put the infrastructure in place for subsequent growth in the neighborhoods. Extending the existing system will allow more individuals access to the city's water supply and offer fire protection to the surrounding homes and businesses.

Members: Austin Lindell, JJ Whicker, Justin Brandenburg, Max Slusser and Nick Stevens.

The City of Angola expressed interest in redesigning a three-way intersection on East Harcourt Road and Williams Street. The intersection rests between the YMCA of Steuben County, Project Help Building and a residential area to the intersection's southeast. Over the past three years, there have been 10 car accidents and reckless driving complaints. The City of Angola is also planning to expand a residential neighborhood north of the intersection. The roundabout will provide a physical obstacle to slow traffic to safe speeds while giving pedestrians safe movement across the intersection. Our group did a Phase 1 design of the roundabout, which included a preliminary survey, geometric design, pavement design, maintenance of traffic, stormwater management and cost estimate.

Members: Hannah Murray, Corey Phillips, Jake Hill, Sloan Panning and Chase Guenin

According to the Trine University website, there are currently 27 varsity sports teams and nine additional club teams. The university has been on the trend of adding a new sports team every year for that last half decade. The campus has also seen an upgrade as there is a new building constructed every year for the last five years as well. Trine has always shown commitment to their students including their athletic aspirations. A new outdoor track and field stadium in partnership with lacrosse and soccer to sponsor a turf infield would be the next feasible addition to athletic excellence at Trine.

Members: Alex Layman, Shawn Conover, Austin Nuessgen and Jacob Conley

Trine University is growing at an accelerated rate. The existing Student Design Center "SDC" is no longer sufficient. Trine gained preliminary architectural drawings from JICI. The group used these to design the structural system, site layout and estimate a general cost to expand the campus.

Members: Keltonn Dillhoff, Garrett Rezmer, Brittany Robinson, Sean Smith and Lee Timmons

In order to attract students to the computer science and information technology (CSIT) program, a platform was needed to present student projects. Our team was tasked with giving prospective students a way to interact with the augmented reality technologies developed in the Trine CSIT program.

Members: Alexander Salim, Cameron Hinman, Garret Harger, Joe Stuber, Josh Sottong and Matthew Exelby

The Cookie Box is a home-based cookie business operated in Wentzville, Missouri. Today the Cookie Box offers a variety of homemade cookie options for local and online ordering. To further the service offerings of The Cookie Box, a proof of concept (POC) monthly subscription service was created. The subscription service will allow two sets of households to create a new tradition by sending homemade baked goods each month.

Members: Garrett Hallford, Logan Sawyer, Brady Stohler, Bryce Stohler and Thad Turner

It is common for owners of waterfront property to own dock systems, allowing for both easier access to the water and docking of various watercraft. In northern states susceptible to freezing artificial structures, especially dock sections, must be removed from the lake prior to freezing to avoid damage. Thus, conventionally property owners must install said dock sections in the spring and remove said dock sections in the fall, by either the property owner or contractor. Installing and removing dock sections can be costly if done by a hired contractor, and if done by the property owner this task can be awkward, time consuming and, most importantly, unsafe if done improperly. The design team was tasked with improving upon a previous iteration of the Dock Dolly, a device used to aid in the installation and removal of dock sections.

Members: Cole Hamlin, Alex LeMaster, Brett McKay and Jake Roach

Ashley Industrial Molding, or AIM, works as a sizable plastic part manufacturer for several industries. This company came to Trine University asking for avail from a senior design team. The issue at hand was the inter-company conveyance crates for the plastic components. The current crates were taking up space and were not as durable as what AIM needed.

Members: Jacob Andrina, Owen Conklin, Drew Hartman and Opal Polk

WL Molding of Michigan, LLC of Portage, Michigan, has maintained a commitment to the quality of products, customer satisfaction and to the continuous improvement of the processes in an effort to create high quality plastic products. WL Molding currently sponsors both the Delrin Rod Cutter team and the Part Catcher and Transfer team. WL Molding produces a product made of three different pieces: two halves of the hinge connected by a pin. The team was requested to help aid the process in accurately cutting the hinge pins.

Members: Jaxon Davis, Christian Richards and Evan Trusty

WL Molding of Michigan, LLC, out of Portage, Michigan, is a large injection molding company. WL Molding mainly focuses on small job shop type orders that cater to the customers' needs. The company came to Trine University for help with an injection molding machine process. A main problem WL Molding has is parts being pushed out of the molds at a very high velocity, this is caused by the injector pins shooting out in a rapid motion. Parts are now bouncing around inside the machine looking for a place to go. At the bottom of the machine there is a funnel in place to catch the parts, however, the funnel does not cover the entire area needed to catch 100% of the parts. WL Molding sponsored the team to develop a system that would catch 100% of the parts. This new design must meet all specifications put forward by WL Molding and additional specifications set by the team.

Members: Quinlan Kubiak, Mitchell Ratekin and Hunter Thourot

A sponsor connected with Trine University and our design team was tasked with creating a bike targeting children ages three to nine, whose frame and components could expand and lengthen as needed to fit a child's growing frame. The team used the sponsor's concept drawings, extensive research into prior patents, concept generation and implementation.

Members: Ethan Deel, Jessie Drew Perry, Holly Loveless and Matthew Zanichelli

The responsibility of the NASA Human Exploration Rover Challenge (HERC) team is to produce a rover to complete a series of obstacles and mission tasks. Specific needs and requirements are presented to the team to create a competitive rover and earn points. The competition is hosted by NASA, where NASA is looking for new and innovative ideas on generating rover designs under specific criteria. As senior design engineering students, the team would have competed at the NASA Marshal Flight Center in Alabama in April 2022. Due to Covid restrictions, though, the live competition was canceled. Instead, a local option was provided so the team could still compete. Alongside the NASA competition, the team has completed a series of assessment and documents to better understand the design process of a product.

Members: Ben Alston, Emma Daniels, Tony Greenman, Stephanie Hartpence, Hunter Klein and Connor Malmquist

Pokagon State Park is in Steuben County, Indiana, and the park receives pallets of firewood shipped by enclosed semi-trailer. For the park to get pallets out of the truck, because the lack of loading dock, the staff is currently dragging pallets out with a chain connected to a skid steer. The task was to design and build a device that is easy to use and limits the number of workers required to two people.

Members: Kyle Aponte, Tony Nikodemski and Aaron Sedwick

While relaxing on a beach or at a public pool, there is no commonly accepted solution to the lack of secure storage for phones and wallets that is both highly convenient and sufficiently secure. The Portable Charging Unit, now referred to as the Secure Resort Table, is a solution to this problem that can be implemented by resorts with either beach front or pool side options.

Members: Dawson Cook, Danielle Korporal, Josiah Krueger and Jaimie Williams

The SMART Glass RV Door team is collaborating with RV retailer, Dexter Vent and Door. Dexter Vent and Door came to Innovation One and Trine University with a design problem in the company's door products line. The design problem was that a typical RV door has little to no privacy for the window compared to every other window in an RV. The sponsor requested that the door be assembled and sold as a standalone unit that can power itself. The team solved these problems with two external solar panels, interior lithium-ion batteries to power the electrochromatic SMART Film, and a self-sufficient electrical power grid, to ensure the door can function alone. The result of the senior design project is a fully functional, stand-alone unit that the sponsor can modify and perfect to be sold to OEMs across the RV industry.

Members: Michael Deaves, Hunter Hlutke and Luke Mikesell

A sponsor had an idea to design and create a solar-powered prototype device that could be mounted near gardens or other plants that functions to fend off wildlife from damaging the planets and trees on the property. The sponsor wants the device to include a means to sense deer, sound production, light and some type of chemical that deters deer. The sponsor would like to use alternating sounds, so deer do not become accustomed to the device's repeated sounds and still get deterred. The team had to analyze the given problem, research existing and past products/patents, evaluate the customer's needs and provide an relate target specifications.

Members: Brandon Cathey, Juan Reyes and Emily Rumph

The Chorale Monophonic Synthesizer is a device used for music production. You can program a series of notes into this device and use the included modules that allow the user to affect the sound output in various ways to personalize your music. The device's internal design is fully modular and open source, making it easy to repair and even modify.

Members: Payton Johnson, Wren Hall, Michael Hudson and Adam Goyetche

When an emergency occurs at Trine University, Campus Safety refers to their Emergency Operation Plans held inside physical binders. The Emergency Operations Application project was brought forward by Trine University's Chief of Campus Safety, Stuart Hamblen, addressing the need to make the physical Emergency Operation manuals into a digital outlet via mobile and web applications. For this project, the mobile application is viewed only, being available on Android and Apple operating systems. The web application side has a viewable portion and a writable portion, where changes to the manuals can be made.

Members: Nathan Ozenbaugh, Kobe Johnson, Josiah Mortorff and Larry Hicks

As a home security system, this design is intended to detect when intruders enter the customer's home. The design is user-friendly from installation to regular use. It is designed to be as close to autonomous as possible.

Members: Nicholas Biegel, Cort Eicher, Maria Steffel and Kendall Whitelow

The security of your own home is something that nearly every person worries about, monitoring it while out of the house and on the go is a way many people can feel more secure. In our Home Security System, we made it a goal for the system to communicate wirelessly between each component, as well as the ability to be controlled and send alerts from an Android cell phone.

Members: Coby Moon, Ethan Long and Cory Thatcher

Our project included created a micro-mouse robot for use in the NRC Micro-Mouse Robotics Competition. A micro-mouse is a robot that fits within a 7" cube and is capable of solving a 10x10 tile maze. The design consists of a few main parts. First is the distance sensors which are used to determine where walls are and how close the robot is to these walls. Next, we have the gyroscope which is used to drive the robot straight down corridors as well as help turn the robot. There are also quadrature encoders which are used for determining linear distances traveled throughout the maze. The robot is driven by two great motors in the rear and a centered ball caster in the front.

Members: Brayton Niccum, Nicholas Rogge and Spencer Seim

ULTRA is continuously improving their manufacturing production floor. Part of this is their manufacturing digitalization effort. In order to make their lines more efficient, real-time data is needed to make adjustments on the fly. Our Trine team has partnered with ULTRA to help them in this effort. Through the use of Ignition, a data tracking and visualization software, the Trine team will provide a dashboard to track target metrics that can be used in this way. The dashboard will collect these metrics for a small part of the manufacturing floor. The dashboard will be used as a model for ULTRA to continue the implementation throughout the plant.

Members: Griffin Lorimer, Dru Walkowski and Nicholas Sawmiller

The purpose of the project is to design, manufacture and test an RC aircraft to compete in the 2021-22 AIAA Design/Build/Fly (DBF) Competition. The theme of the competition this year is a Humanitarian Mission, with the objective of carrying and delivering syringes and environmentally sensitive vaccine vial packages.

Members: Adam Backe, Alex Rushing, Dillon Embry, Harrison Jones, Schuyler McNaughton and Zachary Deutsch

This project continued the modernization and relocation of the control system for a 1943 Baldwin Locomotive Works Universal Tensile Tester. The purpose of the tester is to obtain material properties through either compression or tensile testing, where a given specimen is either elongated or compressed with properties being collected until failure. Previous control of the machine was done via hand dials and wheels giving an output on a paper roll. The new control mechanism allows an operator to completely control the machine via a computer, including test data output to the computer.

Members: Aidan Benysh, William Casey, Jacob Wells and Daniel Wickersham

The BUV project consists of building a Basic Utility Vehicle that can be used in third world countries for loading purposes. This vehicle has been designed from scratch within a six-month time frame and will be tested in the 2022 BUV Design Competition held by the BUV Bearcats in Batavia, Ohio. During the past six months, the team designed and built the frame, roll cage, water system, front end, front wheel assist, wheel/tire type, hydraulic system, electrical system, pedal linkage, adjustable steering and removable hydraulic motor mounts. Another major accomplishment of the BUV team this past year has been the successful integration of virtual reality "VR" into the design stage of the vehicle.

Members: Derik Gunthorp, Wesley Gates, Manuel Urcino, Adam Ellert and Braeden Wallen-Frye

The combat robot project is a competition held in Marion, Ohio, where teams from different schools across the country compete in a competition like the show, BattleBots, where all the robots must be under three pounds. A circular robot was created with a polycarbonate body, with three arms spinning about a central drive shaft which was lathed in-house. The arms were cut and thermoformed and the body was vacuum formed over a laser cut mold. The battery packs were custom made from single-cell lithium-polymer batteries and the circuit board was also custom designed and printed. This combination of components comes together to create a durable and powerful robot that allowed us to be undefeated and get first in the competition.

Members: Connor Brentlinger, Dylan Keating, Daniel Shivley and Alex Walters

The project consisted of designing, analyzing and modifying an electrical go-kart for the Top Kart EV Grand Prix competition. Students were challenged to build off last year's team's kart and improve it to compete in the 2022 Grand Prix in Indianapolis. The team traveled to the 2021 competition in West Lafayette, Indiana, in September to compete against other schools across the county and finished fifth. Teams competed to be the fastest kart while also expending the least amount of energy. The EV Grand Prix uses its position to increase awareness of electrical vehicles and their future to the auto industry. The project consisted of the engineering design process which the team used to design and build improvements to the kart including battery packs utilizing 21700 Lithium-Ion batteries. It also included the calculating and validating of losses throughout the kart through theoretical modeling and testing of the kart.

Members: Brian Morris, Joshua McCallum, Seth Knepper and Mishari Altammami

The group was tasked with creating a laser enclosure for laser marking on large objects that would otherwise not fit inside a typical laser enclosure. All aspects of the laser marking process had to be considered to ensure there were adequate safety measures in place. Many simulations were performed using finite element analysis and computational fluid dynamics software to validate the structural integrity and operation of the enclosure and all its components. As the prototype was constructed, various tests were conducted by the group to determine if each of the safety measures worked as designed and would be able to operate correctly in a real-world application.

Members: Will Huffman, Luke Kimmel, Jack Oaks, Jacob Rider and Andrew Zielecki

Five mechanical engineering seniors designed, built and tested an electric car for the Shell Eco-marathon. This electric vehicle was designed and built for the Urban Concept vehicle class. This design project followed the requirements set by the Shell Eco-marathon Urban Concept electric vehicle class. The goal for this first year project was to go to competition and hopefully pass technical inspection and while the team made it to competition, ultimately fell short of that goal. The team completed several of the subsystems required by the technical inspection teams. During the fall semester, the team designed the vehicle based on the given rules and requirements from Shell. In the spring semester, the team built the designed vehicle with several iterations along the way.

Members: Jon Personett, Kat Burke, Trey Thomas, Mercedes Locklin and Dominic Iacovetti

The 2021-2022 Trine University Shell Eco-Marathon Prototype Gas team's goal was to build a gas-powered, fuel-efficient vehicle to compete in the national competition held in Indianapolis in April 2022. The team had a goal to achieve 600 MPG while passing the competition's technical inspection. To accomplish this, the team made a completely new shell body designed for compatibility and rigidity. Additionally, the engine was tuned to be more fuel efficient, and the electrical system was organized and updated.

Members: Kole Elkins, Jackson Haug, Jacob Hoffman, Shad Neace, Bryce Salmon and Kyra Warren

This project researched and designed a vertical axis wind turbine (VAWT) to meet high efficiency and low windspeed capabilities. After researching and testing existing VAWT designs, the group decided to further investigate the performance of the LENZ type VAWT. This design was validated through wind tunnel testing and further optimized using computational fluid dynamics (CFD). Using CFD, rapid optimization was conducted using a specialized genetic algorithm. Over 250 designs were evaluated in their efforts to find the optimal wind turbine geometry. The team then participated in the 2022 AIAA (American Institute of Aeronautics & Astronautics) student conference where they won first place in the team category for the Midwest region.

Members: Brandon Frymire, Dylan Habig, Tim Mayer, Luke McClung and Trevor Ransbury