Published by the MIT News Office at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Mass.
Published by the MIT News Office at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, Cambridge, Mass.
1992 ELDORADO Students Help to Design Cadillac 2000 By Charles H. Ball News Office If this course at MIT had a title like a movie, it might be called, "The Cadillac Comes to Campus." The actual name is "Design Projects," the senior mechanical engineering design subject taught in the Department of Mechanical Engineering as 2.73. What is different about it this fall is a term project that focuses on creating a Cadillac for the future. There's also an expanded corps of teachers that includes top designers and systems engineers from General Motors' Cadillac Motor Car Division, and a 1992 Cadillac Eldorado for the students to use as a laboratory. In past years, students have designed or redesigned garage door openers, hospital beds, driving controls for handicapped drivers and amusement park rides. But this year is different, say Principal Research Scientist Michael J. Rosen, whose course this is, and Professor Mark Jakiela, who conceived of the new approach and is guiding the liaison with the Cadillac division. "Forget anything you might have heard about 2.73," Dr. Rosen wrote in his syllabus for the project. "This fall it involves a major industrial concern in the definition, presentation, support and evaluation of the term project to a degree for which there is no recent precedent." As for the 1992 Cadillac, Dr. Rosen wrote: "Students will be permitted- in fact, required!-to make use of the vehicle for taking measurements; suggesting possible vehicle enhancement; studying present methods of assembly; removing and disassembling systems and components as needed; and installing and demonstrating mockups of their new designs." "The purpose of this intimate involvement of a company," he added, "will be to provide an accurate snapshot of design as practiced in American industry and to allow students to experience aspects of industrial product development." Describing his motivation for this approach, he observed, "Even though these are seniors who have been exposed to considerable core engineering science, on average they know very little about how design is practiced outside these halls." Team teaching has always been a part of "Design Projects." This year, however, the team includes seven GM engineers who will visit MIT several times to oversee, evaluate and offer critiques of the students' work. "This is an amazing gift of time," said Dr. Jakiela, assistant professor of mechanical engineering. The project will eventually involve some 500 person hours of direct student contact and 100 hours of review time, he explained. He also noted that Cadillac recently has won a number of design awards, which he said made the choice of the Cadillac for the course particularly suitable. "We want our students to view the auto industry as an interesting place to work in terms of design and product development," he said. James A. Price, test engineer for the Cadillac Motor Car Division, said that GM, too, wants to make the industry attractive to engineering students. Beyond that, he said, the current project enables GM's engineers "to tap into young creative energy." He added, "It's really a joint venture to have the students exchange ideas with our engineers. It's a stimulating, thought-provoking method of analyzing current design to see what we can do in the future." Mr. Price said the MIT students have "started, on their own, coming up with things that we've targeted for the future-things we can't even talk about yet." The 125 students taking the course have formed five teams of 25 students each, with each team then subdivided into six system groups of four to five students each. The major part of each student's grade will depend on how well his or her group does, an unusual emphasis in academic courses. For diversity and interest, each team has undertaken the design of the human-interactive systems of a different version of the Cadillac of the next century. In classroom discussion groups and brainstorming sessions, over mockups called "bucks" in a basement workshop, and around the Cadillac itself, the students move from the concept phase through detail design into the processes needed to prepare mockups and drawings. On a recent visit by the GM team, a typical workshop scene had students clustered in groups with the professional engineers, talking, pointing and debating ideas listed on a chalkboard. In one group, they discussed design changes ranging from such serious matters as automatic gas flow shutoffs in accidents, special seats for elderly drivers and more uniform controls to human factors such as keyless ignition and door locks, infinitely variable windshield wipers and built-in coffee makers. The student mockups of their vehicle concepts will be on display to the MIT community on Thursday, Dec. 5 in the Building 13 lobby. The student designers will be on hand to answer questions. The five "vehicle concepts" chosen by Dr. Rosen reflect some of Cadillac's possible thinking for the future, general trends in the auto industry, demographic changes and important themes in the students' education. Briefly, they are: -Cadillac "Chameleon": A car that emphasizes personalized ergonomics (human factors) by making various positions, control feels and display options adjust themselves to the configuration they have learned from each driver when that person inserts a personalized magnetic strip "key." -Cadillac "MTO" (Made to Order): A car that is customized on the assembly line based on an assessment at time of sale of the purchaser's dimensions, driving habits and preferences for where controls and displays should be positioned. -Cadillac "Gray Fox": A car optimized for the sensory, perceptual, reach, strength and reflex capabilities which characterize drivers over 65. -Cadillac "Climber": A car for the young and/or active driver with features optimized for child restraint, child amusement systems, built- in compartments with folding bicycles, and integral container for skis, fishing rods, etc. -Cadillac "Phoenix": Cars that might end up back at Cadillac where materials, components and systems would be extracted for reuse, a concept dependent on economy of disassembly and use of long fatigue-life materials and structures. All the themes, Dr. Rosen said, emphasize "superior ergonomics, innovative functionality, and design for assembly or disassembly-rather than additional layers of traditional luxury appointments-in keeping with Cadillac's intended change in the image and substance of their cars." He added, "This further reflects Cadillac's role as the GM division where innovation originates." When it is time for grading, the Cadillac engineers will assist in the final review. The Eldorado? It will go back to GM for use as a crash test vehicle.