This blog brings together STEM subjects at all levels for middle school, high school, technical/vocational and college levels.
The lessons reinforce classroom theory in the areas that students find most challenging such as the unit circle, force and stress, 3D geometry and material properties.
As we contribute to your students’ global future, we hope you utilize and participate in these lessons.
It's the last unofficial weekend of the summer so do something fun with your family or friends. Take time to dream. I always dreamed about para sailing. Luckily David agreed to try too - always ready to test the laws of physics and try out the wind.
Wind is one of the cheapest and most powerful sources of energy on the high seas. Stephan Wrage, the inventor and founder of SkySails harnessed this natural force with his innovative kite-towing technology and turned it into an industrial application. You can find his inspirational story here.
When I first started teaching engineering design courses I was the only instructor at my college. I was hired on Friday and classes started Tuesday. Luckily there was a holiday on Monday. So our EDU team put together curriculum and lessons to help all CAD teachers at all levels. Yes SolidWorks can help.
Every school, every class, uses SolidWorks differently. So if you were teaching SolidWorks for the first time on Monday you have some options:
1. SolidWorks Tutorials, inside of Help, start with Lesson 1 Parts, Lesson 2 Assembly, Lesson 3 Drawings
Short tutorials takes about 3 hours to complete with step-by-step instructions
If you have more time here are some other areas to explore:
SolidWorks curriculum and lessons, developed for educators and students, are available inside the SolidWorks Education Edition. Lessons include powerpoint presentations, movie files, quiz question, assessments, and projects.
There are hundreds of tutorials inside SolidWorks software. Educators also have access to curriculum and lessons developed at all levels from middle school to college and university. Don't start from scratch in developing your lessons. Let SolidWorks help you. Use our material. You can add your school logo to our Powerpoint presentations.
You can adapt your class to one of our SolidWorks relevant lessons. Teaching robotics? We have an underwater robot project that using a real SolidWorks customer. Our curriculum is based on what industry does. Teaching Finite Element Analysis? Your students can compare the analytical and simulation solutions.
Review our curriculum and lessons at www.solidworks.com/curriculum. Select one of our SolidWorks projects. The bridge project is great, no matter what level you teach. With some balsa wood you can create an inexpensive design, analyze, build, test, break, go have fun, type project.
Get your students interested in SolidWorks outside the classroom, go to www.facebook.com/SolidWorksEducation to see how students and educators all over the world are using SolidWorks.
Find your alpha students - make them helpers or tutors inside the classroom. My own students knew more about photo rendering in SolidWorks than I did. I was ok with that. Let your students take a lead role from time to time.
If you are on subscription, we can help you with your midterm exam or final exam by becoming a Certified SolidWorks Provider. Passing the Certified SolidWorks Associate Exam is a great milestone for you and your students. Educators or administrators can apply at www.solidworks.com/cswa
If you do not have access to the customer portal, ask your reseller for help.
Check out this video showing how to use CircuitWorks within SolidWorks to convert a printed circuit board file into a SolidWorks assembly. CircuitWorks is able to convert a number of different file types. This tool is very useful when trying to design models that contain circuit boards. You are able to input the height of each component that is on the circuit board which lets you adjust you design to allow acquit air flow and clearance around the components.
How do you relate ASTRO BOY, Lego Mindstorms, R2-D2, and the Mars Pathfinder? They are all inductees into the Carnegie Melon Robot Hall of Fame. Now you can vote for the 2012 Inductees.
Review the nominees from NAO to Rosie to Kiva to Big Dog to Wall-E, and all the other robots in the education & consumer, entertainment, industrial & service, and research categories.
For this post, I decided to create a tuning fork. To figure out what pitch it was I created a frequency simulation study to determine the resonant frequency of the tuning fork. I added a fixed portion in the study to simulate someone holding onto the tuning fork. Once the study was run, the frequency calculated was not of an in-tune note. In order to change the dimensions of my tuning fork to sound one of these in-tune notes I created a design study. This was inserted by going under insert, design study, and then add. The variables that I chose were the height of the two tines as well as the diameter of the tuning fork. A range was given for these variables in which the study would be solved. For the goal of what to optimize, I added a sensor to the model. This sensor was set up for the fundamental frequency which was chosen by selecting simulation data under the sensor type and then frequency under the data quantity. With that study created I set the goal to change the variables until the frequency was exactly 440 hertz which is equivalent of an A note. The study was run and the design was determined that resulted in the natural frequency of the tuning fork to be close to 440 hertz. With a couple of refinements of the variable ranges a design was found that had a very close frequency to 440 hertz. Feel free to look at my model below and try your own design study.
Are you teaching a design or manufacutring course? Need a video to excite students about taking your class? Producer Jeremy Bout has made manufacturing exciting by teaming up with PINKBIKE to develop the Reality Redesign contest. I was fortunate to be one of the judges here at SolidWorks, who reviewed these amazing designs. In the final episode, you can see the winning results of Cody, student and designer from California State University - Chico, with his Thomson To I-Beam Adapter.
Cody's design was machined by SolidWorks customer, Straitline Components. Straitline manufactures high performance bike components. In the video, Cody gets to see his design fly into action with Mike Montgomery, high performance bike athlete.
Congratulations to all the students who participated in this Reality Redesign PINKBIKE contest. You shared great designs and great ideas with us.
And thank you to Edge Factor for showing students that design and manufacturing can be amazing. Jeremy and Cody your dreams have come true.
Check out This video that show which tutorials in SolidWorks can help you solve frequency and vibration problems using SolidWorks Simulation. These tutorials look at resonant frequency as well as linear dynamic problems such as harmonic loads and random vibrations. There are a number of problems within SolidWorks that can be solved with manual calculations and then checked using SolidWorks. These are useful to practice concepts that are taught in school. Enjoy!
Battlecry BC13 was a blast! A record number of students attended this year's robot competition at WPI in Worcester, MA, USA.
When the first team shows up at 0800 this morning for our 1600 opening, you know there is going to be excitement!
The tournament winners were FRC 1519 "Mechanical Mayhem" from Milford NH, FRC 125 "Nutrons" from Northeastern (Boston), and FRC 2168 "Aluminum Falcons" from Groton CT.
Other award winners were: FRC 190 "People's Choice, Awesome Offense", FRC 1735 "Noncombative Service Award", FRC 1687 "Medal of Honor".
Ken, Brad, Colleen and many other volunteers at WPI do so much to put on a great event.
I have to thank my colleague Dean Cook who had the honor of being lead judge this year – what a tough job. For those students who got to meet Dean, he is one of those really smart guys here at SolidWorks that just makes things happen. By day, Dean is part of the SolidWorks Web Development team, but by night and early in the morning, Dean dreams robots and asynchronous technology. Thank you Dean for supporting this great robot event on behalf of SolidWorks. Marie
Check out this brief video that shows where to find tutorials within SolidWorks that use design studies alongside with SolidWorks Simulation. Using a design study can help optimize a model based off of important parameters specified by the user. This reduces the number of individual studies that need to be performed and focuses on specific target goals. Design studies are a time saving way to find the best model design for the constraints provided.
For this post I decide to create something typically not seen every day; a hot air balloon. This model was unique in the fact that it integrated surface modeling, solid modeling, and weldments all into one project.
To create the balloon, I used a partial revolve feature to get only one section of the balloon. I then used a circular pattern to create enough segments to create the complete balloon shape. The surface trim tool was used to remove the overlapping material from the balloon. When that was complete, I knitted together the surfaces to form one complete surface. That surface was then thickened and each segment was given a different color.
For the basket, I first created a 3D sketch that was the skeleton frame of the basket. I then used weldments to create the tubing for the basket. Using the weldments as references, I created a series of sketches that gave me points on the outside so that a surface could be created that encompasses the bottom of the basket.
The burners were a fairly straight forward part made but using a revolve feature for the base of it and then two helixes were swept for the wire top. The only difficulty came when connecting the two upper end points of the helixes. In order to do this a 3D sketch was created that used a spline to connect them. Reference lines were used to give points that were in known locations within the space (See image below).
Those parts were brought into an assembly and mated. The ropes were then created in context to connect the balloon to the basket. I also added some propane tanks in order to make the hot air balloon a little more realistic. Enjoy!
Recent Comments