Mechanical and Materials Engineering Department
Portland State University
ME 491/492/493 Capstone Design Experience
Information for Juniors
Overview
The objective of the capstone design courses is to prepare you for a design career. Real design
problems are different than textbook analysis problems in that real design problems have many
clients and a multitude of often conflicting requirements and compromised solutions. In real
design problems there is a shortage of time and other resources as well constraints on
manufacturing facilities, materials, and off-the-shelf components. Time and resource
management is the key to succeed in a design project. Product design in industry is almost
always done by multi-disciplinary teams composed of mechanical designers, manufacturing
experts, management, and marketing personnel to name a few. Depending on the project, the
team may have people from additional disciplines such as electrical engineering, computer
science, materials science, or other specialties.
In the capstone course sequence you learn about the design process, identifying and interviewing
customers, developing the product design specifications, developing engineering specifications,
performing benchmarking and setting performance targets, performing parametric analysis,
developing house of quality, performing external and internal search for solutions, and making
decisions about best options. Another important element of being a good designer is to know
the teamwork processes and project management techniques. You will learn about team
dynamics, conflict resolution, team decision-making methods, how to conduct formal team
meetings and keep team records, and how to divide tasks efficiently. Capstone projects must
have sponsors or affiliates outside of the university. You learn to interact with clients, make
presentations in class and to clients, and learn to write design reports. Finally, you are required
to make physical prototypes of the devices you design and test them to verify that design
requirements are met. For more information about these topics, you may refer to the following
web site: http://web.cecs.pdx.edu/~far/
Capstone Projects
Specific capstone projects are offered to you by the MME Department during the Fall term. You
do not have to find your own capstone projects. Capstone projects must have industrial
sponsors or be a part of an organized professional society design competition. For the last few
years we have had the ASME Human Powered Competition and the SAE Formula-1
competition. In the past, we have also had SAE Mini Baja competition, and SAE RC Airplane
competition. If you are interested in any of these projects, please contact ASME or SAE teams
or ask for the faculty advisors for these student clubs. Industrial projects are presented in class
by industry representatives. If you are currently working in a company and would like to
propose a project, contact the capstone design coordinator and provide industry contact
information about your project. We also have joint projects with the electrical and computer
engineering or computer science departments in which a team of mechanical and electrical
engineers work on an interdisciplinary project. In rare occasions we allow teams to propose
their own projects provided the project meets the academic requirements. In such cases, the
team must identify a practicing engineer outside the university to be the team industrial mentor.
The team must also show the financial resources necessary to build and test their prototype.
Surgical Robot – Sponsored by OHSU
Industrial Water Treatment – Sponsored by Intel
Two Phase Flow – Sponsored by NASA
Volcanic Lake ROV – Sponsored by PSU Biology Dept
Capstone Calendar
The capstone experience is made up of three classes: ME 491 in Fall term, ME 492 in Winter
term, and ME 493 in Spring term. Generally, capstone teams and projects are selected during
the Fall term. In the Winter term the teams engineer their solution concepts into detailed
production specifications. In the Spring term, teams work on prototyping and performance
verification of their designs. A more detailed description of activities during each class is
presented next.
Elephant Enrichment Project – Sponsored by Oregon Zoo
What Happens in ME 491
During the Fall term in ME 491, you learn about the design process, teamwork, project
management, and other skills you need to organize and manage the technical engineering work
on your project. Capstone projects are proposed and by the middle of November all the teams
have formed, selected their projects, have had their introductory meeting with their sponsors,
and have developed a one-page project proposal explaining the scope of their projects. The
proposals are then reviewed by a team of MME faculty advisors and are either approved or
returned to the teams for modifications. Although the official start of your project work and
faculty advisor assignments are made during the Winter term, you can start working on your
projects and perform background research during the Fall term if you link. In fact, large-scale
competition-based projects must have their own project management calendars due to the
complexity of their constructions.
ME 491 also has a mini design competition requirement. For this competition, you form teams
and design and build a simple, usually battery powered device to do a task. In 2009 we had a
pole climber device and the year before that, the devices transferred water from one container to
another using solar power.
ME 491 Mini Project Competitions (from top left): Solar Water Pump, Solar Water Pump, Solar Water Pump,
Pole Climber, Rope Climber, Egg Launcher.
What Happens in ME 492
Your capstone projects officially start in the beginning of the Winter term. In this class you will
put the things you learned in ME 491 to work to create the best solution concept. Your first
deliverable in this class is the Product Design Specifications (PDS) Report which is due at the end
of January. Teams have hour-long formal meetings with their advisors every week. Each team and
each individual in class is required to make a presentation on various aspects of the design process.
There are three phases and three sets of presentations. The first one is the PDS presentation
followed by Internal/External search presentation, and the last one is a Concept Selection and
Progress presentation. A Progress Report is due at the end of this term. Learn to write well
because a good portion of your grade depends on the quality of your writing in these reports.
What Happens in ME 493
The design process continues during the Spring term with an emphasis on detail design including
various analyses, simulations, and other methods necessary to embody the design concept. For a
good part of this term you will be involved with prototyping and testing activities. These activities
include ordering parts, making some parts here at PSU, and possibly developing specifications for
other parts to be made elsewhere. Note that building parts is not required by this class – in many
cases your sponsor may do all the manufacturing. You need to provide construction plans and make
sure the parts and assemblies are made based on your instructions. Most of the teams, however, do
a lot of their prototyping in the MME machine shop to gain more experience with production
machines. Sponsors often provide manufacturing services if you plan ahead of time and give them
plenty of lead time. A final design report is due at the end of the Spring term.
The end of the Spring term, usually during first week of June, is the time for show and tell. Final
capstone presentations are attended by a wide range of audiences including your sponsors, the
faculty, your friends and family, lower grade students, the MME Industrial Advisory Board, and
other professionals. In addition to final presentation, you are required to display your prototypes in
the atrium of the Engineering Building and create poster presentations.
A number of assessment activities take place during the capstone experience as a part of our
engineering accreditation. Two of the important standard tests you will be doing in ME493 are an
FE-type (Fundamentals of Engineering) test and a PE-type (Professional Engineering) test. The FEtype test is about basic mathematics, physics, chemistry, materials, statics, dynamics, and electrical
circuits. The PE-type exam is about your Junior-level classes including strength of materials,
thermodynamics, heat transfer, machine components, vibrations, and fluid mechanics. Prepare for
these exams by reviewing these subjects – they influence you grade in ME 493.
Inkjet Printer Microscope – Sponsored by Xerox
Solar Energy Demonstration Kit
Two-Phase Flow – Sponsored by NASA
Mira’s Ramp – Sponsored by Oregon Zoo
The capstone experience is like your first engineering job. You can learn a lot about the entire
design process from identifying what the customer wants to verifying that your design met the
customer specifications. Along the way you also learn about team-working, project
management, and effective communication. We encourage all of our students to learn more
about the MME capstone design process prior to their senior year so they are better prepared for
their capstone experience. We also invite all of our students to attend part of or all of the final
capstone project presentations, prototype displays, and poster sessions at the end of the Spring
Term. Look out for final presentation announcements in late May.