DSGN119 - Design as a Generic Tool Professor M Neil James - Web page http://www.plym.tech.ac.uk/si This module is intended to taught primarily using web-based resources. This introductory page directs students to these various resources that support the above module. 1. Module Outline - this is the most important document. The hyperlinked html document provides full details of the lecture, assignment and marking schedules, and deals with the peer assessment procedures used in the coursework. It also provides some internet references relevant to choosing project topics. However, you can also use this hyperlink to go directly to the pages that deal with details of the Peer Assessment procedures in both assignments. 2. Module Record - available as pdf document which is useful for printing a hard copy - this details the module aims, skills elements developed during the module, learning outcomes, and gives an indicative syllabus. During your University experience, it is also very productive and formative for students to reflect on the abilities, attributes and skills required by the engineering profession, and by engineering employers. Such reflective analysis of your personal development will greatly enhance your learning during your time at University, and forms an integral part of your Personal Development Portfolio. A linked paper by the Engineering Professors Council covers these issues in some detail and is strongly recommended for your attention and careful consideration. 3. Group member lists - these provide an alphabetic list of students in the class and a listing of the project groups and their members. There are two different group sets - one for DSGN119 (BEng students) and one for DSGN129 (BSc students) - these are available in the module space on the student portal. The importance of Multi-Disciplinary Teams will be discussed in a PowerPoint presentation in class. Note: Assignment 2, on ethical issues in electrical engineering, requires presentations to be made in the scheduled lectures. The spreadsheets indicate the choice of topic for each group and states whether the group is arguing FOR or AGAINST the topic concerned. BEng and BSc groups should link up to present a single composite presentation, which is suggested to be given by a maximum of two people, preferably as overhead slides or as a PowerPoint presentation. 4. Important Diagrams - Some of the more important general diagrams introduced in the module are gathered together on an html page, together with outlines of certain illustrative case studies of interesting and/or innovative design and engineering. 5. Design Principles - A booklet entitled Design Principles - The Engineer's Contribution to Society is available as a pdf file using the hyperlink. The booklet was produced by the Royal Academy of Engineering. It sets out design principles and illustrates them through four case studies. A hyperlinked PowerPoint presentation on Formulating the Design Envelope addresses the concept of 'reflective practice' in engineering design. 6. Concurrent Integrated Design - Following on from the concept of concurrent integrated design (CID) presented on the diagram page, there is a web site devoted to this topic at the home page of the Society of Concurrent Engineering. It is well worth looking at, in particular, the button tab marked Papers & News Articles. 7. Innovation and Creativity - Processes to encourage innovation and creativity have been a long time coming, but are now starting to be integrated into core activities in industry, and into the design process. This html page introduces some of the concepts which are available for 'inventive problem solving' and provides links to other web-based material dealing with innovation, creativity and inventive problem solving. 8. Failure as a Design Criterion - this is an extensive html document which discusses the ways in which failure of the design or engineering processes can manifest itself. This is done through the medium of case studies which make extensive use of images, video clips and references to illustrate the categories and causes of the failures, the lessons to be learnt and the technological innovations which can arise from analysis of failures. As part of the issue of the issue of failure in successful engineering, it is instructive to consider the ethics of safety-critical systems, failure of which puts human lives at risk. There is a nice essay on the ethics of safety-critical systems available at the Department of Computer Science website at the University of Reading. Other information on safety-critical systems, particularly involving software and computers is summarised at: http://archive.comlab.ox.ac.uk/safety.html Many spectacular failures have been caused by relatively small software 'glitches' - often related to a lack of human thought regarding likely operating parameters. This can be a problem particularly when existing software is put into a new product with an different environment. Have a look at the failure of the Ariane 5 launcher on its maiden flight. The ESA website has interesting information generally on their series of rocket launchers. The paper Learning from Failures by J C Chapman is also worth looking at. It was published in the Structural Engineer Vol. 78 No. 9 May 2000. It is available in the library under the accession number Journal 624.1 STR. The website hosted by the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at the State University of New York at Stony Brook provides an excellent review of learning from failure in engineering disasters. There is an interesting paper which deals with the role of fault tree analysis in helping to visualize the ways in which organizational failures create the necessary preconditions for human failure - find it at http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/~johnson/papers/fault_trees/organisational_error.html 9. List of Engineering Successes and Failures - A list of a few well known engineering successes and failures, some of which have hyperlinks to web pages or references to books/articles. This will assist you in choosing a case study to discuss in terms of failure or ethics. This document is available in either pdf or html format. Should you be interested in choosing a dam failure, an interesting link to dams, which details their types, gives examples of failures, covers opposition (and some related ethical issues) to dam building, and provides a dam cracking simulation, can be found at: http://simscience.org/cracks/advanced/dams1.html 10. Poor Product Design - Following on from the idea of 'learning from failure' of designs and the design process, there is a thought-provoking web site which provides a multitude of illustrations of poor product design arising from ignorance (deliberate or otherwise) of the full design envelope. In particular, the interaction between product and user, i.e. the human dimension to design, is exemplified (http://www.baddesigns.com). 11. Ethics and Sustainability - Some internet and other resources available for the study of engineering ethics and sustainability are presented on a separate page. The area of ethics is now extremely well covered on the internet and much excellent teaching material has been developed. Sustainability, is perhaps, less well covered, at least in terms of readily available teaching resources. However, the information available provides strong support for the hypothesis that an innovative, integrated and holistic engineering approach impacts beneficially on sustainability. 12. Safety, Health and Environmental Risk - The Inter-Institutional Group on Health and Safety (IChemE, ICE, IEE, IMechE and the Hazards Forum) has produced a document dealing with the incorporation of Safety, Health and Environmental Risk Issues in the undergraduate curriculum. It is interesting and relevant to this module, particular in respect of its discussion of learning outcomes, which accords well with the philosophy outlined in the lectures. Additionally, it contains information regarding reference reports for a number of famous failures, published by the Health & Safety Executive and the HMSO, and summarises the principal statutory regulations relevant to Health, Safety and Environmental Risk. A copy of the document can be accessed on-line. Some case studies can be found at the Institute of Engineering & Technology website. There are numerous web sites dealing with environmental issues, in particular, environmental risk management. A good example of such a site is Environment Canada which deals with all aspects of the environment (wind, water, climate, ozone layer etc) and contains the on-line news magazine Envirozine. The Related Sites link leads for a page which has a link to a Sustainable Development Information System. Environment Canada's Green Lane contains case studies on environmental emergencies. |