CIMdata PLM Industry Summary Online Archive
17 May 2004
Implementation Investments
Colorado School of Mines Follows Industry Shift Toward SolidWorks
The Colorado School of Mines ( http://www.mines.edu ) has purchased 500 licenses of SolidWorks® software to teach its engineering students the fundamentals of 3D design. The school also uses 500 licenses of COSMOST analysis software to teach students how to test, measure, and refine the projects they design.
Ranked among the top engineering schools in the country by U.S. News & World Report, the Colorado School of Mines was founded in 1874 when industrial mining dominated the Midwest landscape.
The university teaches SolidWorks ( http://www.solidworks.com ) in its Design Engineering Practices Introductory Course Sequence (Design EPICS for freshmen and sophomores). The Education Edition's short learning curve and 3D modeling capabilities help students begin to design projects sooner, and with more in-depth comprehension of engineering problems than if they were using 2D tools.
"Because most people think in 3D, it takes them a while to switch their brains from 3D to 2D," said Bob Knecht, Design EPICS division director at the Colorado School of Mines. "Using AutoCAD® as our primary design tool, we were finding that too many students were spending their time training their brains to view things in 2D rather than for analytical purposes. With SolidWorks, we saw major leaps in the quality of their designs. They finished drawings sooner and had more time to test them."
Students in the EPICS courses are using SolidWorks to design special projects that teach them everything from design planning to 3D modeling shortcuts, analysis, prototyping, and manufacturing. Students in the EPICS I course this year designed a variety of robots that will go into harsh environments such as disaster areas to test for toxic gases, war-torn areas such as Afghanistan to find unexploded mines, or the moon to test for water.
Freshman Nathan Pitts worked with a team of students in his EPICS I class to develop a weather station prototype to be used in high schools across Colorado's Front Range region. Virtually assembling the weather station in SolidWorks allowed the students to see that a crucial circuit board would not fit properly into a PVC pipe housing, saving them the time of fixing the problem after manufacturing had begun. "SolidWorks is to a hand sketch what word processing software is to a handwritten essay," said Pitts. "It is exponentially easier to modify an electronic model and print out a new sketch than redo an entire drawing by hand. The software's interface is very accessible, which helps us finish and troubleshoot designs quickly so that we can move on to the next challenge."
EPICS II students work in teams on projects with industrial partners. The students' results may eventually find their way into real-world applications. One of this year's projects featured a robot that would enter burning buildings as a scout for fire crews searching for victims. Another project was a playground for children with disabilities.
In upper level courses, juniors and seniors prepare for engineering careers by also learning how to use COSMOSWorksT for structural analysis, COSMOSMotionT for mechanical analysis, and COSMOSFloWorksT for fluid flow simulation.
The Colorado School of Mines works with SolidWorks reseller GoEngineer for ongoing software training, implementation, and support.
GoEngineer is a leading software solution provider for mechanical engineers and manufacturers in the western U.S. For more information, see http://www.goengineer.com
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