The
µTechnician bulldogs.kettering.edu/technician
July 25, 2012
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Volume 109
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Issue 2
Kettering goes to Maker Faire Detroit From Kettering Communications Three Kettering University students and one alumnus will be showcasing their innovations at the 2012 Maker Faire Detroit at the Henry Ford Museum July 28 and 29. The Kettering innovators will bring a little of everything including a music-playing suitcase, a robot, and urban farm technology to Maker Faire Detroit; visitors to the Kettering booth can try their hand at making one of two projects from the university’s Innovation Quest project. Innovation Quest, part of the Entrepreneurship Across the Curriculum program at Kettering, is a series of hands-on engineering challenges that involve applying an understanding of basic engineering principles and onthe-spot-teamwork to complete a task. Kettering “makers” are: Devin Hauersperger, who will bring one of her “audio touristers,” a suitcase retro-fitted with a modern audio system that serves as a portable sound system. Hauersperger is a Mechanical Engineering major and Acoustics minor from Troy, MI, working for Har-
man Automotive Audio Systems as a co-op employee. “I love doing projects on my own outside of school and work,” said Hauersperger. “The types of projects I like to do almost always combine technical and creative elements. I wish I could say I came up with this idea myself, but I didn’t. A co-worker saw a photo of a suitcase with speakers in it on the website http://blog.theboomcase.com/ and shared it with me. I thought the project would be really fun because it fits my interests perfectly, and it would be an exciting challenge to figure out exactly what is needed on the inside of these things,” she added. Hauersperger enjoys taking old things and repurposing, or modernizing them, which is why she likes the suitcase audio speaker project. “It involves creativity when it comes to the placement of the speakers in order to compliment the style of the suitcase and technical abilities in the actual construction of the whole system,” she said. Eric Barch built a robot with two other Kettering students (Chass Bak-
ker and Alex Ford) last summer to exhibit at Maker Faire. He has a regular podcast that features interesting projects he builds. It can be seen at http:// ttjcrew.com. He has been making things since high school. The robot is a six-wheel drive offroad platform, controlled by an Android app that Barch, a Computer Engineering major from Oxford, MI, wrote. The motivation behind the project was to demonstrate how to build a robotics control platform utilizing Android and the Arduino microcontroller. This is Barch’s third year exhibiting at Maker Faire. He is currently working on a startup company called Lava with another Kettering student, Billy Lindeman. Their focus is mobile apps and custom electronics. They are using the entrepreneurial endeavor as their Kettering co-op job and have spent the past few months meeting with investors in San Francisco and New York. They plan to graduate in 2013. Continued on page 2.
A Look Ahead… 25
Wednesday
6:30 pm – Open Source Club
Cribathon Lounge
9:15 pm – Dance Club
Bj’s Lounge
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Thursday
12:20 pm – Driverless Cars and the Mobility Internet
Cribathon
7:30 pm – Choir Meeting
Women’s Resource Center
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Friday
12:20 pm – Dog Days of Summer
Pool
12:20 pm – Technician Meeting
3rd floor cc
6:00 pm – Allies
Good Beans Café
July 25, 2012 Continued from page 1. Austin Lawrence and Brian Falther ‘10 are researching a solution to food sustainability with the Urban Tech Farm: Project Grand Rapids, which they describe as “A project to organically grow crops through automation, sustainability and efficiency.” “Our motivating factor is that in 40 years, there are going to be over 9 billion people on the planet,” said Law-
The µTechnician rence, a senior Mechanical Engineering major. “There isn’t enough land on Earth to accommodate and feed that projected population with current technology. We want to upgrade farming technology and bring it into the city.” Currently, Falther, a 2010 graduate, and Lawrence are conducting research on growing techniques like aquaponics – using fish and recycled water to grow food in an interdependent loop
Page 2 system without the use of fertilizers or pesticides. Eventually, they would like to design a prototype vertical aquaponics farm in a repurposed shipping container, and, after proving sustainability, expand to warehouses and other vacant industrial buildings in cities. **Maker Faire Detroit is this Saturday and Sunday, July 28 and 29 at the Henry Ford Museum, 20900 Oakwood Boulevard in Dearborn.**
Entertainment xkcd #1074
“Moon Landing” courtesy of xkcd.com
Ok, so Spirit and Opportunity are pretty awesome. And Kepler. And New Horizons, Cassini, Curiosity, TiME, and Project M. But c’mon, if the Earth were a basketball, in 40 years no human’s been more than half an inch from the surface.
… One Week at a Time 28– 29 Saturday & Sunday
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Sat. 6:00 pm – Anime Club
8:30 pm – RealService
12:20 pm – Technician Meeting
Thompson Hall
Monday Scec
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Tuesday 3rd floor cc