2019cnc4-5

24 www.CNC-West.com CNC WEST April/May 2019 The staff in the UC Davis ESDC have over a century of manufacturing and educational experience between them. Each has their own area of expertise. on cleanup, shop management, machine use and so forth. After they progress past the basic EME50 class they are welcome to come back any time during our open lab pe- riods. Anyone qualified to use the machines is welcome to do so during open lab time. It might be for a specific course or for senior projects like Formula SAE or the steel bridge competition.” Machine time is first come first serve for the most part, but if a student requires staff assistance they need to make an appointment. Students are encour- aged to figure things out themselves, but occasionally they need assistance on the water jet or building a fixture for the DMG MORI machines. Students spend on aver- age 2.5 years in the shop as they complete their studies. “We get better student retention as engineering majors by getting them involved in the ESDC sooner rather than later,” tells Mike. “Analytically and theoretically are not nearly as much fun as hands on experience building and exploring. Other schools even utilize our projects as part of their curriculum because it is a proven learning tool. The EME50 gyroscope project has been going on since the mid 70’s, and is a right of passage for students. It’s not uncommon for graduates to interview for a job and see a gyroscope on the shelf behind the person conducting the interview. They try and play it cool, but every one of them knows exactly what their time was and how they placed in the contest.” All shop projects begin with a manual process and transitions into doing a similar process via CNC. From the Mechanical’s gyroscope and totem projects to the Bio Med’s digital microscope, the teaching and learning prac- Engineering Student Design Center (ESDC) is 10 ,500sq.ft . of manufacturing and learning bliss. With EDM, milling, turning, lasers, 3D printing, a full fab shop and an electronics lab the ESDC is better equipped than many of the local area shops.