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Features: May 6, 2002
Going Up: Home Elevator Project Aids
Disabled, Elderly
A home elevator can cost upward of $20,000,
which is a steep price for a person who might need one to
maintain an independent lifestyle. Students in Rensselaer's
O.T. Swanson Multidisciplinary Design Laboratory have built
a solution: a home elevator that will cost thousands less
than devices currently on the market.
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Thomas
Griffin
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Last semester, students built a 6-foot-high
scale model of their rack-and-pinion-driven elevator to
test the idea. This semester, 23 students from mechanical,
materials, electrical, and industrial engineering have completed
a working full-scale, two-story version of the in-home elevator
in the O.T. Swanson MDL's Fabrication and Prototyping Area.
The project is sponsored by United Technologies Corporation
(UTC).
Casey Kruger '02 and John Hobden '02, both
mechanical engineering majors, have high hopes for the project.
"We'll have some recommendations to make to UTC,"
said Hobden. "We're pretty confident with our model,"
Kruger added.
Hector Hurtado '02, an electric power engineering
major from Ecuador, is grateful for the experience he received
while working on the project. "The hands-on experience
taught me to anticipate problems I didn't have to worry
about in class. Also, since English is not my first language,
I was able to learn new engineering terms by working with
students in other areas of engineering," he said.
The team-oriented and industry-like atmosphere
of the O.T. Swanson MDL is "a win-win situation for
the students and industry sponsors," said Robin Miller,
UTC's representative. UTC is so impressed with the experience
that the firm will sponsor another project next year.
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