State whether or not you currently have a mentor, and what the status of your interview is with that person (I have completed the interview, I have scheduled the interview, I have not scheduled the interview, etc).
- My mentor is Eric Fodran. I am hoping to do my interview on Saturday,October 24, 2015, in person. This will be my first time meeting him because he has just gotten back from a business trip.
At this point, your research is probably guiding your studies toward more specific areas within your topic. Name the area or two you find most promising and explain your reasons.
- I am really interested in aircraft manufacturing and aircraft designing. I find aircraft manufacturing to be really promising because of the amount of research I can do. There are just so many factors that go into aircraft manufacturing, like manufacturing strategies that can improve the cost effectiveness of aircraft. Moreover, the actual quality of any product depends on the manufacturing process. While I do believe that there is really nothing wrong with current manufacturing techniques, I think that there are ways to improve them. The other area I am interested in is the designing phase. When I picked my senior topic, aerospace engineering, I always thought of the design phase. I wanted to learn more about how an aircraft is designed and tested; however, as I did research throughout the year, I learned that being able to find mentorship on this is very hard and is almost impossible. First, finding a mentorship who will allow you to talk about the projects they are working on is impossible; finding a mentor by itself is hard. Next, even if I did find a suitable mentor for this topic, it would be difficult for me to learn what they are doing. Designing an aircraft involves a lot of math; mostly math that I have not done yet.
What kinds of sources do you think will help you in the next month to gain more research depth? Where will you go to get them?
- I think that I can gain more research depth by finding scholarly articles and research journals. In fact, I am already trying to do this using the Cal Poly Pomona databases. In addition to this, I can also use textbooks and articles from the Cal Poly Pomona library.
Write down a possible EQ. Please don't worry about wording other than ensuring that it provides the option for multiple correct answers. At this point, the senior team is most interested in understanding your thought process.
- How can one reach maximum cost efficiency with today’s feasible technology?
- I really like this question because it can be answered in many ways. For example, I talked about how the manufacturing process determines the quality of the aircraft. According to one of the research articles I’ve read, “Design for Manufacturing of Composite Structures for Commercial Aircraft – the Development of a DFM Strategy at SAAB Aerostructures,” the manufacturing process is actually what determines the aircraft’s price. Another way I can answer this is by using the other sub-topic of Aerospace–the design process. For example, fuel efficiency of aircraft is something that engineers always try to improve on. This can be achieved in multiple ways, with the two biggest being the wing design and the engine design. These are only two ways I can answer this essential question. I believe that with more research I can find more specific answers to this.
