Professional Design Tips for Young Engineers — Transcript

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1. 0:00I feel confident saying that if you're
2. 0:01new to engineering or you are a maker
3. 0:03who wants to take your designs to the
4. 0:05next level, you'll find this information
5. 0:06helpful. By far the most important first
6. 0:08step when engineering a solution is to
7. 0:11define the problem. Well, co-workers,
8. 0:13salesmen, your boss, whoever comes to
9. 0:15you and they say, "We need to engineer a
10. 0:17more efficient lawnmower." I'm going to
11. 0:19ask you the same question without the
12. 0:20solution baked in. We need to shorten so
13. 0:22many acres of grass in so many minutes.
14. 0:24Whenever someone brings a problem to me
15. 0:26like this, that is a problem where the
16. 0:28solution is sort of semibaked in, I
17. 0:30[music] ask very gentle but probing
18. 0:32questions to try to figure out if those
19. 0:34constraints really exist. If you can
20. 0:36master this skill, both the people
21. 0:38skills as well as the probing questions,
22. 0:39[music] it'll keep you from rehashing
23. 0:41ideas that have already been worked and
24. 0:43allow you to really innovate.
25. 0:45Constraints usually fall into one of
26. 0:46three categories. that is time
27. 0:48constraints, how quickly this needs to
28. 0:50happen, quality [music] constraints in
29. 0:52terms of material and appearance, and
30. 0:54finally cost constraints. [music] What
31. 0:56is your budget? There aren't nearly as
32. 0:58many new problems as you might think,
33. 1:00and there's a very high probability that
34. 1:01the problem you're trying to solve now
35. 1:03has been solved by someone else already.
36. 1:05The thing that you're trying to create
37. 1:06may exist, but has a name that you don't
38. 1:08know of. At this point, you might be
39. 1:10tempted to open your CAD software and
40. 1:11just start creating a 3D model. This, to
41. 1:13me, is the hardest part. So, what I
42. 1:15typically do is start with a 2D model
43. 1:17first. You want to keep your model
44. 1:18simple and easy to change. By the time
45. 1:20all the people involved have had a
46. 1:22chance to review it, even if you're just
47. 1:23designing something for yourself,
48. 1:25there's going to be something you want
49. 1:26to change. A lot of that additional
50. 1:28rework can be avoided if you carefully
51. 1:30select what parts are made to the origin
52. 1:32and how things are built from there.
53. 1:34When I first started engineering,
54. 1:36[music] I didn't even know what an
55. 1:37inmill was. But what I did know is that
56. 1:39I could talk to a machinist who did know
57. 1:41how my part was going to be made and I'd
58. 1:43say, "Hey, how would you make this part?
59. 1:45And do you have any input that might
60. 1:47make this part easier to fabricate?"
61. 1:48Taking a few minutes to talk to these
62. 1:50guys will make your job easier. It'll
63. 1:52make their job easier and it'll make
64. 1:54your parts cheaper. It's also important
65. 1:56that you think about how your product is
66. 1:58going to be used [music] and how it can
67. 2:00be misused. One of my favorite
68. 2:01engineering quotes is an engineer who
69. 2:04thinks his product is foolproof has
70. 2:05underestimated the ingenuity of fools.
71. 2:08The next thing I want to talk about is
72. 2:09controlling cost. In my opinion, this is
73. 2:11the scariest part of engineering because
74. 2:13as the engineer, you control most of the
75. 2:16cost. Engineers who are stupid expensive
76. 2:18don't keep a job very long. Design your
77. 2:20part too weak and people get injured.
78. 2:22This is not what you want either. This
79. 2:24whole next section on my list is about
80. 2:26how to innovate. Thinking outside of
81. 2:28solutions you've already seen before.
82. 2:30Let's just take power sources. Our minds
83. 2:32tend to drift towards the most familiar
84. 2:33power sources like plugging things
85. 2:35[music] in. And then next, of course,
86. 2:37would be battery powered. But there are
87. 2:39many more options outside of that,
88. 2:40right? There's pneumatics. You also have
89. 2:42other options for electricity like
90. 2:44mechanically generating power. You can
91. 2:46list out your pros and cons. Compare
92. 2:48those to your constraints, which you've
93. 2:50already defined. Looking at these
94. 2:51together will let you know what your
95. 2:53real options are. Of course, I'm leaving
96. 2:54out some power options here, but I
97. 2:56expect to see many of those in the
98. 2:58comment section.