ME

72

Preliminary Design Review (PDR)

Due
Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2007

(time
to be scheduled for each team)

(worth
20% of your overall grade)

In
any large system engineering project, an important step in the design process
is the Preliminary Design Review (PDR).
The PDR is conducted after preliminary design efforts have been initiated, but
before the detailed design phase has begun. The goal of the PDR is to ensure
that the overall system architecture
chosen by the design team is adequate, and likely to meet the design objectives
while satisfying the system design constraints. The PDR is also aimed at
finding weaknesses in the design or design process at an early stage, where
they can be easily addressed.  The
PDR should also pinpoint where additional work is needed before detailed design
and prototype construction begins.

The PDR will be conducted in 20
minute sessions with the course instructors.  During these sessions, we will review
your preliminary designs and analyses, while also trying to identify areas where
further work is needed.  For these
reviews, you should prepare at least
the following

·  Diagram(s) of your concept. That is, describe visually the architecture of your overall
system.  From your diagrams, we should be able
to grasp the key properties of your proposed design solution, and how all of
the parts work together as a system. More detailed sketches of the critical
components are welcome.

·  Mock-ups of key components. While mock-ups are not required, they are welcome. They
need not be elaborate—cardboard, Styrofoam, and tape are perfectly fine
mock-up materials.  A rough mock-up
prototype should answer a question about a system component: what will it look like, how will it function,
or what role will play in the overall system?

·  Preliminary Analyses. If you have carried out preliminary computations related to
energy storage or production, lift and drag of your flyer, etc., please
summarize these in a digestible form.
More details of your calculations can be incorporated via
appendices.  Your presentation of
the preliminary analyses should focus on how the analyses affected your design.

·  Summary of any experiments.
Have you
carried out any experiments to help make design decisions?  If so, describe them.

·  Open Questions. Are there issues that still need further investigation?  Are further analyses needed? Are you
still considering multiple design options for some key components?

·  Risk assessments.  Are there items in your
design that you are not confident about?
Where can your design or fabrication process go wrong?  Is there a critical component in your
design whose failure would jeopardize your contest entry?

There
are many possible formats for presenting this information.  Each team should select a format that
best fits their design and the team personality.  For example, the PDR materials could be
a set of PowerPoint slides, or a stapled set of 8x11 sheets of paper. Since we
will want to keep your PDR materials for a few days for grading purposes, you
may want to photocopy any items, such as analyses, that you will need.

We will grade your PDR as
follows:

·
Quality
of the proposed solution.  Is it
likely to yield good performance?
Is it practical?  Can it be
readily implemented?

·
Quality
and appropriateness of preliminary analysis. We are not necessarily looking for
reams of analysis at this point.
But did you carry out analyses that could help you make design
decisions?

·
A
demonstrated understanding of the strengths and weakness of the proposed
solution, and the remaining tasks that must be completed.