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CCSU Student Featured in New Britain Herald
Building
a Better Robot
Keith
Macht makes a less expensive machine
By
HERALD STAFF
December 07, 2002
NEW
BRITAIN -- Who wouldn't be pleased with an outside consultant whose work
had the potential to save a company thousands of dollars and who
provided his services free of charge?
That,
in effect, is what Central
Connecticut State University engineering technology student Keith Macht did
for the Engelhard Surface Technologies of East Windsor this year when
Macht designed an expensive and efficient new spray gun for Engelhard as his senior project.
Engelhard's
main business is to put protective coatings on parts used in aircraft
and in joint replacement surgery. The $50,000 robot that was being used
to spray these parts was actually much more sophisticated than Engelhard
needed. Consequently the few parts of the robot being used were in
constant need of expensive repair.
Macht's
father, Alan, a financial officer at Engelhard who was paying these
bills, alerted his son to the problem and suggested it as a possible
school project.
Macht
first looked into replacing the robot with a ready-made robot of a
simpler design. At $10,000 to $20,000, these still cost more than
Engelhard wanted to spend. And so, armed with what he had learned in his
classes at Central, Macht set to work designing a robot from
off-the-shelf components.
In
addition to being inexpensive to maintain and operate, the robot needed
to be able to withstand a dusty environment and be easy to move. That
meant a machine that would also be small and light enough to flip on its
side, Macht realized. "This idea turned the machine's side-to-side
motion into an up-and-down one, and instantly doubled its
usefulness," Macht said.
The
estimated price tag on Macht's final design? $5000, or one-tenth of the
cost of the machine it was designed to replace.
These
cost savings may be unusual but Macht says his robot design itself is
"pretty typical" of the projects students in Central's
Manufacturing Engineering Technology program tackle. Indeed other CCSU
manufacturing engineering technology student projects have involved
submarine life support systems and solar/electric automobiles.
Central's
School of Technology has offered a B.S. degree in Manufacturing
Engineering Technology since 1982. Currently about 70 students study in
a program that Dean Zdzislaw Kremens describes as "balancing theory
and application to provide students with a detailed understanding of
applied engineering while in school, and many employment opportunities
after graduation."
In fact, Macht had hardly passed the paper about his "linear motion machine" in to Professor Zbigniew Prusak when Macht was hired by Pratt & Whitney. The May '02 CCSU grad currently spends his days accessing the repair needs of used jet engine shafts. Eventually he hopes to be involved in jet engine design. If so, prepare to see the cost of new airplanes drop dramatically. Reprinted by permission, The Herald Ó2002 |
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