Alumni Supported Senior Capstone Design Class
Over the course of one or two academic semesters, seniors work in teams to develop advanced engineering projects. Besides working with a faculty instructor, they also are given an opportunity to work with professional mentors from the industry once a week and participate in national competitions. By working on capstone projects the students learn to deal with open-ended questions, and get a chance to pull together the many things they've learned in classes throughout their undergraduate degree.
Senior Design could not happen without the support of many contributors, including sponsors, guest speakers, financial supporters, and many others contributing in-kind supplies, services, and technical assistance. Financial sponsors of the senior capstone design course include: the John D. Akerman Memorial Fund; the AEM Richard and Shirely DeLeo Scholarship & Engineering Fund; the AEM Alumni Program Initiative Fund; and the Minnesota Space Grant Consortium and industry sponsors such as ATK, Boeing, MTS, and Honeywell.
We would also like to acknowledge some of the industry partners who have provided mentors to our students such as: Orbital ATK, NASA and National Institute of Aerospace, Sentera, United Technologies Aerospace Systems, Xcel Energy, Boeing, Cirrus Aircraft, and Honeywell.
Summaries of the 2018-2019 design projects can be seen below:
Sponsor: John Weyrauch: U of M
Design goals:- Develop conceptual design of bi-propellant, liquid fueled, single stage rocket that will reach an apogee of 100km
- Design must include:
- Mass budget
- Propellant selection
- Engine design
- Fuel shutoff safety system
- Airframe structure
- Flight dynamics analysis
- Electronics and altitude monitoring
- Vehicle recovery system
- Total impulse < 200,000 pound-seconds
- Total burning t < 15 seconds
- Ballistic coefficient < 12 psi (ballistic coefficient is defined as the weight in pounds divided by the frontal area of rocket)
- Design report is due to the competition in March 2019
Sponsor: Todd Colton: Sentera
Design goals:- Design, build, and test a quadcopter drone with a 30% reduction of drag and increased range compared to traditional quadcopter designs
- Streamline fuselage
- wind tunnel test showed 14-40% drag reduction (depending on pitch angle)
- Avoid propeller downwash interaction
- Increase usefulness of quadcopters by increasing endurance at a cruise speed.
Sponsor: Chris Regan: U of M
Design goals:- Must fit disassembled into a small box
- Aircraft assembled in less than 3 minutes
- Hand launch from specified zone
- Aircraft carries 2" PVC payload. Carry as much payload as possible
- Fly a closed trajectory making two 180 degree turns
- Successfully land in landing zone
- Maintain control at all times, utilize a 2.4 GHz frequency system, meet all competition safety standards
- Fully packed 10 lbs weight limit including all payload
Sponsor: James Flaten: U of M
Design goals:- Design an efficient supersonic rocket with a dual deploy recovery system
- Rocket must fly twice
- Build a non-commercial data suite
- Recover the rocket and relaunch within one hour
- Extra competition points for adding video capability to the rocket, adding a radio telemetry system, and implementing capability to get judges key flight parameters within 5 minutes of landing
Sponsor: Demoz Gebre-Egziabher: U of M
Design goals:- Measure and transmit desired hypersonic aerodynamic data during entry and meet mission and CubeSat constraints
- Design a Concept of Operations (CONOP) for HyperCube
- Determine the flight envelope in terms of Mach number and altitude
- Place center of mass as far forward, up to 7 cm from the geometric center, of the CubeSat along the Z+ direction
- Provide a reliable network and hardware to transmit experimental data to the ground without a designated ground station
- Maximize static margin using the solar panels as drag surfaces
- Minimize aerodynamic loading of solar panels
- Have system power supply for continuous operation for all components
- Must remain unpowered for at least 45 min after launch
Sponsors: Suneel Sheikh: ASTER Labs
Design goals:- Design a system capable of recycling material from existing communications satellite
- Produce usable 3D printer source material
- Capable of producing ~ 30 metric tons
- Recycle 2 times the total mass of the system in usable materials
- Operate for 10 year effective lifespan
- Process 4 typical GEO satellites a year that are brought to the system in accordance with satellite disposal standards
- Have a maximum launch mass of 15,300 kg
- Meet Falcon Heavy maximum payload size requirements
- Store recycled materials for yearly pick up
- Dispose of waste according to international space standards
- Design a system capable of recycling material from existing communications satellite
Nav & Surveillance for Air Taxi
Sponsors: Vibhor Bageshwar: Honeywell
Design goals:- Develop navigation and surveillance systems for air taxis
- System design to include requirements, sensors, redundancy, and failure modes analysis and mitigations
- Define air taxi route infrastructure including rules and regulations, and weather constraints
- Air taxis operate along specified routes and takeoff and land at designated stations
- Routes will sit above Class G airspace and below 2500 feet
- Air taxis will avoid flying over restricted airspace without clearance
- System will include a certifiable collision avoidance system
Sponsor: Vivak Saxena: Advisory Aerospace
Design goals:- Design the propulsion system for a four seat eVTOL air taxi, specifically the propulsor installed in the tilt rotor
- Design includes battery, wiring and power transfer, motor and propellar
- The cruise speed of the aircraft shall be 100 knots
- The range of the aircraft wil be 100 nautical miles
- The aircraft shall be fully electric
- The sound pollution produced by the aircraft will be acceptable for operation in urban areas
Sponsor: Yohannas Ketema: U of M
Design goals:- Develop a satellite design including a capture method capable of deorbiting the defunct EO-1 satellite in LEO
- Deorbit satellite mass < = 1000kg
- Look at net, or harpoon, or Ion Beam Shepard as capture method
- Satellite system design to include: spacecraft bus, control and navigation system, propulsion, power, thermal control, and telemetry and communications
- Decide launch location and booster for the debris removal mission
Find My Pet Drone System LASSIE CDR
Sponsor: Charles Bye: Honeywell
Design goals:- Reduce the time a pet is missing by autonomously searching an area that would take an individual or several individuals considerable time to accomplish
- Utilize onboard imaging and image processing and a radio transmitter in pet's collar
- Transmit photo/video feeds for pet identity confirmation
- Maintain pet in the field of view of the drone
- Send location and comments to the search team in order to retrieve the pet
Sponsor: Christopher Gosch: Northrop Grumman
Design goals:- Implementing deployable wings which can provide significant additional lift to current 81mm HE mortar configurations
- Design, analyze, and characterize the real-world performance of a wing and deployment mechanism for a circular cross-sectioned projectile body using CFD and FEA tools
- Analyze aeroelastic effects to assure wing and overall mortar system performance
- Meet performance requirements at velocities up to 180 m/s
Sponsor: John Weyrauch: U of M
Design goals:- Create a reusable vehicle to go between Cis-lunar orbiting Gateway and the moon with two mission modes
- 6 days of the surface with 2 crew and 500 kg of cargo
- 2 days on the surface with 4 crew and 100 kg of cargo
- Design that allows for future improvements
- Technology readiness by 2028
- Consist with human spacecraft requirements addressed by NASA Technical Standards 3000 and 3001
- Efficient orbit transfers/ deliveries
- Create a reusable vehicle to go between Cis-lunar orbiting Gateway and the moon with two mission modes