Engineering / Senior Design

MECE 4340 - MECE 4341 Mechanical Engineering Capstone 1 & 2

Team #1 - Open A.R.M.S. (Always Ready for Ministry and Service)

My capstone team and I set out to create a senior design project that would benefit the Houston homeless population. After researching the needs of the homeless, we found that dry socks are one of the most requested clothing donation items by Houston’s homeless community, but sadly, they are one of the least frequently donated. Wearing wet socks for extended periods of time can lead to frostbite, infections, and other serious health concerns. The homeless community also does not usually have reliable access to electrical outlets, so we needed to utilize alternative sources of energy in an affordable manner. Under the sponsorship of World Cinema Inc., we decided to design and fabricate a device that heats and dries socks using the kinetic energy of a moving bicycle. We are doing this by using friction to generate heat and utilizing the natural airflow around a bike as it travels translationally to transfer this heat from a frictional coupling into the moisture in a sock.

This project provided valuable experience for designing on a strict budget. In order to make this design economically feasible for the homeless population, we went through countless design iterations to reduce production cost while still maximizing efficiency. To determine and compare approximate efficiencies of different designs we ran CFD simulations and used the feedback from these simulations to improve our design. We also ran FEA simulations to ensure each design was capable of withstanding the loads applied during use. Additionally, the fabricator of this device allowed our team to physically witness the construction of this project and they provided extensive feedback on different ways to reduce the amount of time and resources necessary for fabrication. It has yet to be determined if this product will be affordable enough to have much of an impact on the Houston homeless population, but regardless the experience gained and lessons learned during this project made these two semesters of Senior Design by far the most valuable courses of my undergraduate career.

For more about my academic and professional accomplishments, select the following link to my Interactive Resume.