Mechanical Engineering

405. Thermal/Fluids Laboratory.  This laboratory course allows students to perform thermo/fluid experiments to underscore the material that they learn in the thermodynamic and fluid mechanics classes. This laboratory course also has a component that teaches the students how to construct and perform their own experiments. The material covered in this section includes the mathematical design of an experiment, instrumentation, signal processing, statistical analysis, and data presentation. The students are also required to investigate a physical phenomenon experimentally. Three hours laboratory (3 credits).

Prerequisites: MECH302, MECH318 and MECH325.

Course Objectives:

The student will be able to:

• Design and perform experimental procedures to verify principles of thermal fluids

• Conduct experiment to obtain valid data

• Analyze experimental data to quantitatively evaluate the system

• Interpret experimental data to assess system performance

• Analyze errors and limitations of experiments

• Use data acquisition systems

• Prepare the report, exhibit technical writing skills and presentation

Course Syllabus:

Textbook:  

Thermal/Fluids Laboratory Manual, by Mechanical Engineering Department

Topics:  

1. Introduction

2. Experimental Statistics

3. Design of Experiments

4. Instrumentation

5. Data Acquisition

6. Experimental Standards

7. Data presentation

8. Experimental Ethics

9. Programming with Labview

10. Thermal-Fluids Experiments

ABET category content as estimated by faculty member who prepared this course description:

Engineering Science: 3 credit (100%)  

Prepared by:  Dr. Graham Walker Date: June, 2002