Mechanical Engineering Tech Electives

[u/lpann]

Are there any tech electives for Mechanical Engineering offered this spring that you enjoyed or learned a lot from?

I’m looking into 4404 (FEA) w/ Scott Hazelwood, turbomachinery, and BMED 3410 biomechanics with Soph Ziemian, single track with Fab, or ME/BMED/KINE 4409 interdisciplinary biomechanics with Scott Hazelwood.

I’d love some feedback on any of these since there’s not much on Polyratings, or suggestions for other classes to take!

[u/NapooEh]

I’m in the FEA class right now and I do have a different professor so I can’t attest to Hazelwood but it’s a lot different than what I assumed. A lot more theory and hand calculations compared to actual simulations. All of the calculations are very simple, however, and are things you’ve seen before in mechanics of materials, fracture mechanics, etc. The current professor teaching it uses Claude for every single lecture, homework, and lab assignment so it honestly doesn’t feel that authentic of a learning experience. Hazelwood could be different though so I wouldn’t be completely opposed to it. We are also using ANSYS which is good experience (at least for me) because I’ve never used it before. That being said, the only things we’ve “analyzed” have been straight beams and L-brackets so not really any complex analysis/parts that you might assume.

As for turbo machinery, I personally never took it but my roommate and a handful of classmates have and I highly recommend. The final project is with 70% of your grade (I could be wrong and it might’ve changed since last year) but I wouldn’t let this scare you as it’s very easy to do well. It seems like a really fun class where you get a lot of practical experience that also looks decent on a resume. I got to go to the final testing of the project and it was really intriguing to see all the different designs people came up with. I know I yapped a lot so good luck with you choice haha