Still deciding which specialisation to pick? MECHATRONICS is obviously the answer! If my previous blog posts still haven’t been able to convince you to choose MECHATRONICS, maybe this one will. 😉
I had a fantastic time looking at the part four MECHATRONICS (and mechanical) projects down at Newmarket campus a few days ago. There were so many impressive displays about super fascinating topics, such as “performance analysis and optimisation of wine bottle coolers”, “performance of a needle valve in the helium pressurisation system of a liquid-propellant rocket”, “eye-tracking system for diagnosis of visual deficits” and “use of chitosan-based materials for microfabrication: a feasibility study”.
The part four students were also dressed in business/semi-formal attire and looked really nice and professional. 😎 I didn’t know what they were talking about half of the time because of how advanced their projects were compared to the stuff we learn in part two. Nevertheless, I thought their projects were insanely cool! 😍
(The thumbnails are blurry, but if you click on the pictures, they aren’t.)
The MECH projects were divided into six categories :
- Thermofluids and Speed Racing (basically applying MECHENG 211 content with speed)
- Dynamics and Control (MECHENG 222 plus a lot of prototyping)
- MECHATRONICS (MECHENG 201 and MECHENG 270)
- Acoustics, Design and Manufacturing (I know there is an elective called “Acoustics for Engineers” that you can take in 4th year so I presume it is to do with sound engineering)
- Design, Manufacturing and Industry 4.0 (think 3D printing and improving current technology or tools used in industry)
- Composite Materials and Manufacturing (development of composites and other cool materials)
*The description inside the brackets is my personal “interpretation” of the categories. The types of projects offered by the department each year may change.
Most of the projects were done in pairs and took about a year to come into fruition. You get to choose your partner and they can be someone from either of the MECHs. This means lots of researching, testing, prototyping, analysing, experimenting, designing and failing. 😂 Ultimately, I think the part four MECH students found the entire learning process and final products of their projects to be extremely rewarding. The students I talked to were really enthusiastic and proud of their work and it seemed like they had loads of fun. 😊
I also had a brief look at the electrical and electronic, computer systems and software engineering projects, but I obviously thought the MECH ones were wayyyy cooler! My main reason was that these MECH projects lead to the creation or design of products that you could touch and see in real life. I felt the other specialisations lacked physical products. Yeah, I guess creating an app is cool, but personally, I love the idea of being the creator of a physical object you can touch, use and show off to other people and go “wow, I MADE this”.
Getting the opportunity to see what engineering content I’ll be learning in the next two years and the kind of projects I’ll be working on in my fourth year has made me really excited and grateful for specialising in MECHATRONICS. Hopefully, if you choose to specialise in MECHATRONICS too, you’ll be just as excited! 😄
~V
