The ability to engineer stiffness and strength in any desired direction make composites an ideal material candidate for various applications when compared to their traditional isotropic counterparts. In spite of this, the ability to model the material response in composites has yet to be fully explored. Composite research largely focuses...
In the mid 1930's the Diesel engine, which formerly was used only as a large, low-speed machine, was developed into a smaller
high-speed engine for use in trucks, busses, and tractors. Along
with these changes in mechanical design came many problems, of
which a major one was lubrication. Because ordinary...
Formula Student challenges collegiate teams around the world to compete against one another in global racing competitions. Global Formula Racing (GFR) is a collaboration between Oregon State University and German at Duale Hochshule Baden- Wurttemberg Ravensburg students to build a racecar. The task assigned was to create a pedal assembly...
The Oregon State University chapter of American Institute of Astronautics and Aeronautics competed in the Design/Build/Fly competition for the second time during the 2013/2014 school year. This chapter began at Oregon State in 2012 and still lacks an organized management system for the Design/Build/Fly team that could allow OSU to...
An experimental framework for investigation of the effects of Micro Pin Fin Arrays (MPFA) on the fuel oxidation efficiency of catalytic combustion is presented in this thesis. Complete combustion of the fuel is essential for operation at maximum efficiency and high standards of environmental cleanliness desired in existing microscale combustion...
The ability to develop mobile applications for smartphones and tablets is an increasingly valuable skill in today’s labor market. This thesis details the development of the mobile application Drone Drop from beginning to finish. I first describe the background research conducted to learn about programming languages and other tools used...
The Formula Society of Automotive Engineers (FSAE) has provided a platform
for teams like Oregon State’s own Global Formula Racing Team (GFR) to produce a
formula style race car and compete with other schools across the world. The GFR team
has used the same carbon fiber monocoque chassis since the...
Every Spring and Summer, thousands of climbers attempt to summit Mt. Rainier. Many of them stop at Camp Muir, a base camp at 10,000 feet, where they can use restrooms, camp overnight, or refill water bottles before continuing their climb. Camp Muir currently uses a gas system to melt snow...
The reliability and survivability of a wave energy converter (WEC) is highly dependent on the variability and non-linearity of the ocean itself. Ocean variability occurs on many time scales. Climate variability occurs decade-to-decade, and year-to-year in the number and intensity of winter storms. Seasonal variation of wave height and period...
This describes the development of a new fuel flowmeter. Among the desired features were an accuracy of ±2%, a linear response to fuel flow rate, a means of increasing the sensitivity at the low end of the meter scale and portability so that it would be equally useful in the...
As modern systems continue to increase in size and complexity, they pose significant safety and risk management challenges. System engineers and much of the government research efforts are focused on understanding the attributes and characteristics that emerge from the interactions of components and subsystems. As a result, the objective of...
The purpose of this project is to examine the effect of the slot gap spacing on a multi element rear
wing. A three element rear wing is used in order to produce maximum downforce at the relatively
low speed of Formula SAE competitions. These high lift configurations serve to increase...
A combined experimental and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) study of single-phase liquid nitrogen flow through a microscale pin-fin heat sink is presented. Such cryogenic heat sinks could find use in applications such as high performance computing, spacecraft thermal management, and hydrogen storage thermal management. A circular pin fin heat sink...
Modern electronics have created increased demand for innovative cooling solutions. Typical forced convective cooling systems consist of pumps that circulate cooling fluid. However pumps can be unwieldy for many applications. This research is a continuation of work done at Oregon State University and Auburn University on the passive pumping of...
Wave energy holds great promise to be part of the alternative energy portfolio that will provide independence from fossil fuels. As wave energy converter (WEC) technologies mature, designing effective control strategies to extract maximum energy, extend device life, coordinate WEC operation within an array, or mitigate negative impacts of a...
Bipedal robots represent a unique class of control problems that combine many of the most difficult elements of nonlinear control. These robots are typically designed to be mobile and as such have limited energy and actuator authority making efficiency a prime concern. Unlike wheeled robots, legged robots must transition between...
As the growth in demand for sustainable manufacturing continues, companies must begin to make conscious design decisions with regard to the sustainability of their products. This means balancing economics of production with environmental and social performance. Thus, design and manufacturing engineers must consider economic, environmental, and social aspects simultaneously when...
A new technique is developed to recover elemental tellurium (Te) from cadmium telluride (CdTe) which is abundantly available in photovoltaic semiconductor waste. The method is based on microchannel fluid flow with the use of a supported liquid membrane (SLM) between the donor (feed) and acceptor (strip) channels. A predictive theoretical...
Infrastructure systems are a critical component supporting today's modern society. From
power grids to traffic networks, we rely on these systems to perform as intended, despite
the various sources of uncertainty present in their operation. Designing for system
robustness can help mitigate the impact of failures caused by unexpected events....
This thesis is the combination of two research publications working toward a unified strategy in which to represent complex engineered systems as complex networks. Current engineered system modeling techniques segment large complex models into multiple groups to be simulated independently. These methods restrict the evaluations of such complex systems as...
The ATRIAS agile humanoid robot, along with a number of other spring-mass walking
machines, currently have two instabilities: one resulting from inertial forces on the torso
which cause the robot to spin like a top, and another resulting from stiff ground collisions
which cause chattering of the point-contact toes. This...