16SMCE310 16SCVE310 – Engineering Skills Project Brief .docx

16SMCE310 / 16SCVE310 – Engineering Skills
Project Brief: Flume Ride
Introduction
Employers are constantly asking for engineering graduates who
have good team skills, are
problem solvers and are good communicators. On top of that,
engineers need to be creative and
innovative. They have to work with many constraints, while
developing safe products and
solutions to help the community.
Your team is working on a large project at a consulting
engineering firm in Kuwait. Your boss
has approached you to find a solution to a problem. Given that
the current engineering tasks on
the project all seem to involve the same standard, your boss
asks your team to design and build a
fully functional Flume Ride within a proposed Fun Park on a
piece of land near to the sea shore
in Salmiya.
Project description

A Flume Ride is a balance between safety and sensation.
Naturally, the ride should be as safe as
possible. After all, if the people are injured riding the Flume
Ride then there would be fewer
repeat riders. Fewer repeat riders mean a short life span for the
Flume Ride. No to mention the
severe legal implications that could be imposed on the owner of
the Flume Ride and the
engineers responsible for the design. Keeping in mind that
passengers ride a Flume Ride for the
“death defying” thrill. Here, the key to be successful is to give
the rider the sensation of speed
and acceleration. It all comes down to speed control. To achieve
this, the hills, curves, dips, and
straight always are not randomly designed.
Your job as an engineer is to design a simple Flume Ride
similar to the attached figure. The
track starts with an inverse vertical curve followed by a ramp as
shown in the figure. The car
should reach the small water pool at the end. You are also
responsible for designing the Flume
Ride car. In this project, you are expected to discuss and
document some of the principals

involved in real-life design. You are also responsible for
building the Flume Ride and the car.
Requirements:
The owner (represented by your Instructor) has constraints
regarding the material to be used.
Each team member needs to develop individually a design idea,
to analyse the structure using
hand calculations or software (i.e. SOLIDWORKS, AutoCAD,
Staad.Pro, etc.). Your team needs
to discuss advantages and disadvantages of the design ideas,
showing your evaluation criteria on
a decision matrix. Other requirements are:
1. The Flume Ride MUST BE inherently safe. The car should
not fall off the track.
2. The minimum clearance between ground and Roller Coaster
track should be 0.5 m.
3. The maximum height of the Flume Ride track should be 1.5
m.
4. The maximum plan area in which the Flume Ride is built in is
2.25 m2 (1.5m×1.5m).
5. The maximum Flume Ride track width is 0.15 m.
6. SOLIDWORKS must be used to design the Roller Flume

Ride.
7. Flume Ride car should be manufactured using 3D printing
technology.
8. Flume Ride car should be designed to carry 1.5 kg load.
9. The Flume Ride track should be made of wooden sticks or a
sheet metal based on truss
shapes.
10. The weight of the whole Flume Ride structure should be as
light as possible.
11. The Flume Ride structure must be able to withstand the
rolling car and an additional 1.5
kg of extra load.
12. All joints need to be pin joints (using wires) or be glued.
13. All work has to be carried out on-campus.
14. The Flume Ride has to be ready for testing in week 12.
Students of the winning team who best meet the requirements
will be awarded the “Flume Ride
design competition certificate”, awarded by ACK’s School of
Engineering.
Project Submission
Each team is responsible for submitting a complete design a

technical report that must contain
some of the following engineering fundamentals:
1. Design and additive manufacturing (3-D printing)
fundamentals:
a) Apply your engineering skills to design the best Flume Ride
to meet the
requirements given, showing all valid and clear assumptions.
b) Show all of your calculations including your safety factors.
Your team needs to
discuss advantages and disadvantages of your design ideas,
showing your
evaluation criteria on a decision matrix.
c) Determine any other design related calculations and/or
assumptions
d) Complete your design using CAD software (i.e.
SOLIDWORKS, AutoCAD,
etc.). 2-D drawings are required for your technical report. 3-D
models are needed
for additive manufacturing purposes and they are expected to be
presented on
your final presentation
e) Convert your 3-D models to the appropriate format (i.e. STL,
STEP, etc.) so you

can make your car and any other required materials using
additive manufacturing
(3-D printer).
2. Statics & Dynamics principles:
a) Calculate all forces required for the car and the Flume Ride
structure including
the shear, compressive, and axial loads (columns).
b) Work out and detail all governing equations and those
resulted from the car
motion at each element of the track.
c) Plot the axial forces vs. the track length
d) Provide a graph of car speed with the additional weight vs.
track length
3. Physics Principles:
a) Apply and show all related physics calculations
b) Determine all energy analysis at each element of the track
resulted from the
motion of the car
c) Graph total energy vs. track length

4. Mathematical principles (equations representing the adopted
track)
The following nontechnical principles are also expected to be
submitted in your technical report:
1. Decision Matrix
2. Risk Assessments
3. Project Plan (Gantt chart)
DEADLINES: The design must be completed by the end of week
11 to be tested on week
12. The technical report is due to be submitted with your
portfolio on December 1st, 2016
at 12:00pm.
A Guide to
Technical Report Writing
Australian College of Kuwait

School of Engineering
Engineering Skills (ENEG11001)
1. Introduction
Technical report writing is an essential part of engineering
communication - you are communicating the results of your
work to someone else.
Once ‘published’, your technical reports will become a long-
lasting record of your proficiency and ability as an Engineer.
The following topics will be discussed:
• General report layout and presentation
• Report sections
• Report formatting
• Tables, figures and graphs
2
2. General Report Layout and Presentation

The key points in effective written communication in
technical report writing are:
• Logical and neat presentation
• Clarity
• Concise expression
• Continuity between sections
When you write a report be mindful of the purpose of the
report. More is not necessarily better – give enough detail so
that you present a convincing case. Third person, past tense is
generally accepted.
3
2. General Report Layout and Presentation
Some important points to note:
• Only print on one face of each page
• Bind the report so that it is easy to read and ensure
that no part of the report is concealed by the binding
• Ensure that tables, figures etc. are not ‘fragmented’
over two pages
• Ensure that a section heading is not separated from
the section text due to end of page/start of new page

• Use a spellchecker but be aware that it will not pick up
incorrect usage of words eg. there/their.
4
3. Report Sections
• Title Page
• Executive Summary
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures/Tables
• Abbreviations
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Literature Review
• Methodology
• Results and/or Discussion
• Conclusion
• Reference List
• Appendices
5
3. Report Sections
• Please note, that while there is a basic standard layout for
technical report writing, you must accept the possibility of
variations in requirements for different ‘clients’.

• You must be flexible and adaptive in these circumstances.
• You need to be certain of the requirements for a specific
report.
6
3. Report Sections
3.1 Title Page
This should clearly show the name of the client, the report
title, report date, the author’s name and the author’s
organization.
The Title Page is the first page of the report to be viewed by
the reader and should show the above information clearly,
and be well presented.
7
3. Report Sections
3.2 Executive Summary
The Executive Summary is best left until the rest of the report

is written. A concise summary of the work contained in the
report should be given.
The Summary should be brief, but not omit any important
information. Abbreviations should only be used when they
are acceptable. The Summary should ‘stand alone’ without
reference to any other part of the report, and include the
main results of the work.
8
3. Report Sections
3.3 Table of Contents (TOC)
Should be generated once the report is complete. If you use
the Word heading styles, you can get Word to generate the
TOC for you.
Example:
Executive Summary ii
Table of Contents iv
Acknowledgements ix

1 Introduction 1
1.1 Brief overview of the Australian Sugar Industry 2
9
3. Report Sections
3.4 List of Figures/Tables
Should be generated once the report is complete. If you use
the Word captioning, you can get Word to generate the list
for you.
Example:
Table 2.1 Comparing CLP and IP 74
Table 4.1 Cane schedule results 142
10
3. Report Sections
3.5 Abbreviations
You can generate this as the report is compiled. You should
also put the full name and the abbreviation the first time it is

used in the text. eg.
… many well-known operations research (OR) problems …
After the first time, you can use just the abbreviation in the
text. eg.
… is a well known OR problem that has been …
11
3. Report Sections
3.6 Acknowledgements
This is where you acknowledge help or resources that
particular people or organizations have given you.
12
3. Report Sections
3.7 Introduction
The origin, purpose, scope and objectives of the work should
be briefly outlined in the Introduction to enable the reader to
assess the significance and value of the work.
If needed, the Introduction can include a discussion of the
theoretical background for the work. If this is extensive, a

separate section may be justified.
The Introduction ‘lays the groundwork’ for the more detailed
statements and discussions in the body of the report.
13
3. Report Sections
3.8 Literature Review
The Literature Review is an account of what has been
published on this topic by others. It is part of the introduction
to your report. In writing the Literature Review, your purpose
is to convey what knowledge and ideas have been established
on a topic.
Your Literature Review should:
• Be organized around & related directly to your project
• Identify areas of controversy in the literature (if any)
• Identify a best method of approach to solving the project
objective
14
3. Report Sections

3.9 Methodology
A detailed description of how you performed the work in this
project. This should include engineering calculations and
other technical information required for the work that
occurred.
15
3. Report Sections
3.10 Results and/or discussion
Detail all your results and/or discussion. This may include
data presented in graphs etc.
Should include a critical examination of results and possibly a
comparison of results with theory if relevant.
16
3. Report Sections
3.11 Conclusion
A short summary highlighting the project results, outcomes
and how these met the objectives.
A summary of results by itself is not a conclusion.

Recommendations may be made in this section, but if the
recommendations form a substantial part of the report,
include them as a separate section.
17
3. Report Sections
3.12 Reference List
List all reference material used to conduct the work and
produce the report.
Reference material may include textbooks, websites, journal
articles, other publications/reports etc.
We will look at referencing in more detail later in this
presentation.
18
3. Report Sections
3.13 Appendices
The Appendix of a report should be used to include relevant
information to support the contents or subject of a report.

The Appendix can also be used to include large parts of the
report (such as pages of test data) that are part of the work
but if included in the body of the report, would detract from
the report ‘readability’.
19
4. Report Formatting
4.1 Page Numbering
Pages prior to the Introduction such as the Table of Contents
should be numbered using lower case Roman numerals, for
example - i, ii, iii, iv, etc. You can set the numbering style in
Word under
The Title Page is usually page i but the number is not shown
on the page.
The Introduction is page 1. To change the page numbering
Introduction. Then on the Introdu
20
4.2 Section Numbering

Each section of the report should be numbered starting with
the Introduction as Section 1, for example:
Executive Summary
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
1. Introduction
2. Literature Review
3. Methodology
4. Results
5. Conclusion
Reference List
A. Data from Experiment 1
B. Sketches
21
Sub-sections should be numbered as follows:
3 Methodology
3.4 Mathematical Formulation of the Problem
3.4.1 Known quantities
3.4.2 Calculating the total number of activities
Use the heading styles in Word then
Bullets and numbering
If you do this, Word will generate the TOC (table of content)

for you including the section numbers & page numbers.
22
Appendices
B Data
In order to get Word to do this properly you will need to start
a new Section and generate your own heading styles eg.
Appendix 1 etc.
23
5. Tables, Figures and Graphs
Tables should be numbered using upper case Roman
numerals:
Table III Table IV
The Table number and description should appear above the
Table. (example to follow)

Figures should be numbered using Arabic numerals:
Figure 1 Figure 6
The Figure number and description should appear below the
Figure. (example to follow)
Figures can be drawings, diagrams, photos, graphs etc.
24
Table III: Comparison of experimental and theoretical bending
stress.
Load (N) Experimental
Bending
Stress (MPa)
Theoretical
Bending
Stress (MPa)
Variation (%)
0
10

20
30
40
0
25
Driver Mounted Accelerometer
Upper back or neck.
Cushion Base plate
Legend
Acceleration
Direction of Measurement
Cabin Floora,b c
d
e
f
g

Figure 1: Accelerometer locations and orientation.
26
Lever Arm 1 - Torque verses Rotation
0.00
2.00
4.00
6.00
8.00
10.00
12.00
0.00 1.00 2.00 3.00 4.00 5.00 6.00 7.00 8.00 9.00 10.00 11.00
12.00
Rotation (degrees)
T
o
rq
u

e
(
k
N
m
)
Figure 3: Torque verses Rotation for lever arm 1.
27
6. Referencing
You should reference to:
• Show support for a statement
• Show how your work relates to other people’s work
• Allow readers to find out more information
• Acknowledge your sources
• Justify your claims
You can find information on referencing in the following
document:
“Abridged Harvard Referencing Guide_2013.pdf” on the
homepage of this course on PowerCAMPUS
Engineering uses the Harvard (author-date) system of
referencing.

28
6. Referencing
Referencing in-text examples:
… of which 35.6 million tonnes were crushed in Queensland
(Australian Bureau of Statistics 2000).
Dalfiume et. Al. (1995) used CLP to schedule trains ….
Figure 1.1 Sugar cane growing areas
Source: Bundaberg Sugar 1998
29
6. Referencing
Reference List example:
Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) 2000, 7121.0 1998-99,
Agricultural Commodities, viewed 21 June 2000,

www.abs.gov.au.
Bratko, I. 1990, Prolog – Programming for Artificial
Intelligence, 2nd ed, Addison-Wesley Publishers Ltd.
Chow, K.P & Perett, M. 1997, ‘Airport counter allocation using
CLP’, Proceedings of Third International Conference on the
Practical Application of Constraint Technology PACT ’97,
London, pp. 107- 116.
30
http://www.abs.gov.au/
7. Conclusion
Technical report writing is an essential part of
engineering communication. You are
communicating, in written form, a body of work that
is important to your employer or client.
As an author, you must present a report that is neat,
logical, factual, accurate, clear and concise – your
professional ability will be judged by the quality of
your written work.

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