IDE project-based learning

Back to IDE Course Overview

Woven throughout the Integrated Design Engineering degree, students have the opportunity to take hands-on, design-based versions of the traditional courses offered through various college of engineering departments. Both versions of these courses cover the same material, but IDE versions are taught by our faculty and include hands-on design, where students get to put theory into practice and learn by doing.

Here are a few examples of student projects from our IDE classes. 

GEEN 1400: First Year Engineering Projects

Mountable Wind Turbine

Fall 2021

Our team designed our product for the purpose of capturing wind power at a small scale.

Our team designed and built a mountable, portable turbine that can be placed anywhere using a magnet system. The majority of the turbine is made with 3D printed material, and circuitry runs along the inside to the bottom, where there is a compartment. In the compartment, a portable battery can be placed, which would then be charged by the turbine. The product performed extremely well and was met with positive feedback.

 

Students: Caleb Buter, Zak Chehadi, Eli Doherty, Basile Lame, Robert Wang

GEEN 2400: Engineering for the Community

Climbing Hand Holds for Visually Impaired Climbers

Fall 2022

We aimed to make indoor rock climbing more accessible to visually impaired climbers through light up, user controlled hand holds.

The goal of this project was to increase equitable access to climbing. Many people suffer from visual impairment, including color blindness, low vision, and light/dark perception only. Indoor climbing gyms are particularly inaccessible as climbing holds of similar colors are often placed next to each other and many areas are poorly lit. Furthermore, current products that could act as potential solutions are costly, difficult to implement, and do not have a focus on increasing access to climbing. Therefore, this project sought to create a solution that indoor climbing gyms would be excited to adopt that was also centered on feedback from visually impaired climbers.

To meet this goal, our team integrated LEDs into clear climbing holds. The user can then control the brightness and color of the holds from a simple app. The climbing holds are linked by which route they belong to, allowing the user to change the appearance of many holds at once. Users can set the climbing holds to a color they can easily identify and increase their brightness in darker areas. These handholds can be used on existing climbing walls, interchangeably with regular handholds. Furthermore, cost estimates show our product to be significantly cheaper at scale than existing alternatives.

People: Connor Borshard, Annalie Haralson, Sydney Zimmerman, Trace Shimek, Sydney Shortridge

The Paint Train

Spring 2022

We developed an art spinner that can be used by people with limited mobility or disabilities to create one-of-a-kind art pieces.

Our project consists of designing a paint dispenser that will be attached to an existing art spinner. The client we worked with was Imagine Colorado and they work with people with disabilities and limited mobility. We built a 3-D printed "carriage" in which a cam rotates and pushes down on the paint tube to dispense the paint. The 3-D printed carriage was placed along a rail which allowed the mechanism to slide while keeping it supported and secure. Due to the extensive testing and iterations that were conducted, this final design provides a reliable safe way to dispense the paint and allows for quick and easy replacement of paint tubes for those using our product.

 

People: Ruby Martinez, Caden Keating, Mateo Thomas, Monique Ness, Tony Samour, Usman Khan

GEEN3400: Innovation and Invention

Dr. Delivery

Fall 2021

Our product is designed to remind users to take medications at proper times in the correct doses, overall decreasing the risk of medication noncompliance.

Our product is an automated pill dispenser that allows users to set a schedule for dispensing their medications. Dr. Delivery eases the task of taking medications by organizing and storing up to four different medications, securely locking access to medications, setting a schedule to dispense medications, and reminding the user to take their medications. When unlocked, the lid will reveal four separate compartments. Users can empty each medication type into a given compartment. The compartments can store at minimum dosage for a month鈥檚 worth of each prescription. Note the capacity may vary based on the pill鈥檚 size and frequency of dosage. Design considerations have been made for safety and aesthetics. The system is constructed of laser cut acrylic and beveled edges. A Raspberry Pi serves as the controller of motors, solenoids, and GUI touchscreen The lid has the ability to lock and unlock to prevent unwanted tampering of pills. Users can confirm their medications and the schedules associated with them using a touchscreen interface. The system dispenses a pill at the appropriate schedule and confirms the correct dosage has been dispensed. The pill dispenser does so with a weight scale that cross-references the known weight of the dosage with that dispensed. If there is no discrepancy, the pill is made available to the user. The pill dispenser will additionally alert the user that their medication is ready via sound and light notifications. If an appropriate period of time passes, and the weight scale indicates the medication has not been removed, additional notifications will be given to the user.

Group Members: Alanis Wilson-Ehrenthal, Julien King, Anna Ngyuen, Lizbeth Montoya Dominguez,Riley Fitzpatrick

GEEN 3010: Circuits

Minesweeper IRL

Fall 2021

For this project we decided to build Minesweeper but with a twist. Our game was not merely a software on a computer but a physical version of this classic game.

For our circuits final project, we chose to recreate Minesweeper, the classic game that came pre-installed on most old Windows computers. In our physical version, the colored numbers are replaced with RGB LEDs that light up the button pads according to a key printed on the top of the casing. The flags are physical caps that are placed on squares the player believes to be bombs, while an LCD screen displays the number of bombs on the field and a timer for how long the player has been playing.

At the conclusion of the game, the screen displays 鈥淵OU WIN鈥 or 鈥淕AME OVER鈥 depending on whether the player successfully navigated the mine field or not. Being able to design and construct a printed circuit board that allows all of our components to function successfully in unison indicates that we were able to utilize what we have been learning in class all semester in practical applications. And while constructing our game, we were able to learn other useful skills that can be applied to future projects, such as coding, laser cutting, and PCB manufacturing.

Students: Lizbeth Montoya Dominguez, Emi Szabo, Anna Nguyen

GEEN3852: Thermodynamics

Compressed air powered jet engine

Fall 2022

We were asked to build a physical model of one of the cycles we had learned about in class.

Our team decided to use compressed air to run a model Brayton Cycle. Once we decided on a design, we built the outer casing, compressor blades and turbine in SolidWorks. From there we sourced the hardware we would need to attach the compressed air to the turbine and attached pilot tubes to estimate the total energy at various points throughout the engine. Our project was successful in demonstrating the operating theory behind the jet engine!

Students: Emily Harrison, John Bileschi, Matthew French, Adin Barnes