Designing Machines from Patent to Simulation
Designing Machines: From Patent to Simulation
Grainger Faculty Instructor: Harry Dankowicz, Professor of Mechanical Science and Engineering
Dates: Next Course TBD
Location: Illini Center, 200 S. Wacker Drive, Chicago, IL
Course Fee: $2900 per learner
CEUs: 2.0 (estimated)
Who Should Attend
The target audience for the course Designing Machines: From Patent to Simulation includes inventors, designers, hobbyists, teachers, and artists with some experience with foundational tools of engineering mathematics and modeling. Manufacturing engineers, physical plant supervisors, patent and IP attorneys, K-12 science/engineering instructors, architects, and those managing machine design projects are expected to gain knowledge directly related to their professions.
Course Description
Innovation in machine design stems from the many ways in which mechanical structure can be deployed to achieve function, converting power and energy into a predictable and desirable mechanical output. The scope of application of such innovation spans from the artistic through the industrial to the therapeutic, ranging from kinetic sculptures or autonomous factories to exoskeletal devices for rehabilitation of neuromuscular function.
The course Designing Machines: From Patent to Simulation aims to build working familiarity with the relationship between machine structure and function. Its just-in-time instructional design is placed squarely in the realm of applications, bringing mathematical and computational techniques to bear on practice when needed to validate intuition and verify detailed design choices. This is accomplished by building the learning experience around the analysis of patented inventions, demonstrating how a patent description may be reduced to a mathematical model that can be simulated on a computer in order to visualize function.
Through a combination of instructor-led demos and active-learning practicums, participants will explore key design choices in order to develop critical judgment about their functional and structural advantages and disadvantages.
Learning Outcomes
The course Designing Machines: From Patent to Simulation, aims to enable participants to
- Recognize key design elements of machines that relate structure to function.
- Understand how to turn a conceptual machine design into a computer simulation.
- Evaluate competing designs in terms of range of function and complexity of structure.
Computer and/or Software Requirements
Participants should bring a laptop computer.
Resources and References
- Dankowicz, H., Mambo and the Mambo Toolbox. http://danko.mechanical.illinois.edu/Mambo/
- Dankowicz, H., “Teaching Advanced Modeling of Multibody Mechanisms to Non-traditional Engineering Students.” http://danko.mechanical.illinois.edu/Mambo/ASEE.pdf
- Dankowicz, H., Multibody Mechanics and Visualization https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9781852337995
Sample Course Outline
Day 1 – Building blocks
8:30 – 9 am |
Introductions and highlights |
9 – 10 am |
Instruction: Making sense of patents |
10 – 10:10 am |
Morning break |
10:10 – 11 am |
Guided exploration: Reading patent documents |
11 am – noon |
Instruction: Graphical models and hierarchical representations |
Noon – 1 pm |
Lunch break |
1 – 2 pm |
Instruction: Linkages, cables, transmissions, platforms |
2 – 2:10 pm |
Afternoon break |
2:10 – 3 pm |
Guided exploration: Mechanisms and degrees of freedom |
3 – 4 pm |
Instruction: Patent #1 (e.g., an amusement park ride) |
4 – 4.30 pm |
Concluding remarks |
Day 2 – Movement and animation
8:30 – 9 am |
Review and highlights |
9 – 10 am |
Instruction: Patent #2 (e.g., a collapsible stroller) |
10 – 10:10 am |
Morning break |
10:10 – 11 am |
Guided exploration: Perspective on movement |
11 am – noon |
Instruction: Rolling, sliding, steering |
Noon – 1 pm |
Lunch break |
1 – 2 pm |
Instruction: Singularities are your friend |
2 – 2:10 pm |
Afternoon break |
2:10 – 3 pm |
Guided exploration: Patent #3 (e.g., a sphere-orienting apparatus) |
3 – 4 pm |
Instruction: Patent #4 (e.g., a motorcycle suspension) |
4 – 4.30 pm |
Concluding remark |
Day 3 – Physical realism
8:30 – 9 am |
Review and highlights |
9 – 10 am |
Instruction: Forces and torques, push and pull |
10 – 10:10 am |
Morning break |
10:10 – 11 am |
Guided exploration: Levers, jacks, counterweights |
11 am – noon |
Instruction: Patent #5 (e.g., an exercise apparatus) |
Noon – 1 pm |
Lunch break |
1 – 2 pm |
Instruction: Contact, musculoskeletal loads, aerodynamics |
2 – 2:10 pm |
Afternoon break |
2:10 – 3 pm |
Guided exploration: Patent #6 (e.g., a prosthetic limb) |
3 – 3.30 pm |
Concluding remarks |
About the Instructor
Harry Dankowicz is professor of Mechanical Science and Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He earned his Master of Science in Engineering Physics from KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden in 1991 and his PhD in Theoretical and Applied Mechanics from Cornell University in 1995. He has held faculty positions at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and, since 2005, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Prof. Dankowicz is a recipient of a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) from the US National Science Foundation, as well as the Fred Merryfield Design Award and the Archie Higdon Distinguished Educator Award from the American Society for Engineering Education. He serves as Editor of Applied Mechanics Reviews and is an author of several textbooks, including on the design of multibody mechanisms, and an inventor of a self-calibration technology for harvest combine mass-flow sensors.
Short Courses & Custom Programs
Keri Carter Pipkins
Associate Director for External Workforce Development
217-333-9630 . kcp@illinois.edu
www.linkedin.com/in/keripipkins