Internet Resource Guide: Penn State Undergraduate Mechanical Engineers

Internet Resource Guide: Penn State Undergraduate Mechanical Engineers Matt Murphy February 12, 2015 English 202C Technical Communications

Table of Contents 1.0 Front Matter 1.1. Contents of Guide 2 1.2. Intended Audience 2 1.3. Assumptions about the Reader 2 1.4. Organization 3 1.5. Tips for Using the Guide 3 2.0 General Information 2.1. Penn State Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering Site 4 2.2. American Society for Mechanical Engineers Site 5 3.0 Homework Help 3.1. Chegg Study 6 3.2. The Engineering Toolbox 7 4.0 Research Materials 4.1. The Statistical Abstract of the United States 8 4.2. Catalog of U.S. Government Publications 9 4.3. ASME Digital Collection 10 4.4. Journal of Mechanical Design 11 1

1.0 Front Matter 1.1 Contents of Guide: Contained in this guide are resources relating to information useful for undergraduate mechanical engineers studying at Pennsylvania State University. This guide contains vital information about the mechanical engineering program at Penn State, websites to help students succeed in their classes, information about mechanical engineering community and recent developments in the engineering profession. This guide could be used for homework help, scheduling classes, networking or even research. 1.2 Intended Audience: This guide is intended for Penn State engineering students, specifically mechanical engineering, of any year. Some of the resources in this guide contain high level knowledge content or career help aimed more at junior and seniors. However the majority of the guide would be extremely useful to all years of mechanical engineering students as well as any engineering discipline. Some sources provide homework and class help for students who feel they are behind or not fully grasping the content I being taught in class. This guide also addresses students whom are looking for internships, full time jobs or even just help building a resume or networking. 1.3 Assumptions about the Reader: This guide is designed to help students find the help they are looking for. A student must have an interest in learning more or seeking help about mechanical engineering. For example if a student needs help with homework, research, jobs or networking this guide can be extremely helpful. This guide merely contains links, abstracts and tips about websites that can help students, not the information itself. It is also assumed the user is competent with a computer and has internet access, as all resources are located online. Finally this guide assumes that the user is a current student in or interested in mechanical engineering, however many of the resources could be useful for undergraduates at other schools or of other engineering disciplines. 2

1.4 Organization: This guide is broken up into 3 sections: General Information and Career, Homework Help and Research. The General Information and Career section gives details about the mechanical engineering curriculum at Penn State, where to find job opportunities and scholarships and information about the mechanical engineering community in the professional world. The Homework Help section contains useful websites that will help students gain a firmer grasp on information taught in class. This section also features where to find solutions to many textbook problems and even how to get help from an online tutor or learning module. The final section Research Materials focusing on where to find articles about current developments in the mechanical engineering community. The resources in this section also feature conference proceedings, research papers and general statistics about mechanical engineering and its profession. 1.5 Tips for Using the Guide: Under each resource abstract are specific tips for that resource about how to navigate the site and what relevant information can be found. The table of contents will successfully illustrate where each section can be found and what particular resources are in each section. Each resource is titled, and then under title is the type of resource it is, and next is the web address to access the resource. 3

2.0 General Information 2.1 Penn State Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering Site Website Home page: http://www.mne.psu.edu Undergraduate page: http://www.mne.psu.edu/undergraduate This is the home page for the Penn State Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering Department. The website is a great source of information for faculty, undergraduate and graduate students and even potential students applying or transferring to Penn State. From the home page the reader can see a stream of recent news pertaining to the engineering world at Penn State as well as full directory of staff and a calendar of upcoming events. The Undergraduate page has an abundance of useful and practical information for any Mechanical or Nuclear Engineer. The left hand side of the undergraduate page contains headings for all pertinent information for the major like: Curriculum, Study Abroad, On Campus Research and Undergraduate Teaching positions, Scholarships and Career Resources. One particularly useful page is the Curriculum page where a student could find all courses required for each major and even a recommended schedule for all 8 semesters. The Scholarship and Career Resources pages are also very useful and redirect the users to a page full of scholarships and job opportunities. Most relevant information is on the Undergraduate page; the main page is more for recent news and upcoming events. The Curriculum page is where most important and practical information is including different options and programs within the major and a comprehensive list of acceptable general and technical electives. The link on the undergraduate page titled Fall 2014 ME Student Orientation material is something to skip. This document only contains information for incoming freshman and all important information can be found under the Curriculum tab. 4

2.2 American Society of Mechanical Engineers Site Website Home Page: www.asme.org This website is the home page for the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), which provides information about all aspects of the organization including membership, recent events and conference and conventions. A large portion of the site is targeted at people already in the professional field, but there are many areas of the site that could be useful to an undergraduate mechanical engineer. The top of the page has a bar of tabs: Topics, Network, About ASME, Shop ASMER and a search bar. The Topics page contains a list of all topics pertaining to engineering from business to boilers. Each individual page contains recent articles pertaining to the field and upcoming events related to the topic. Under the Topics page there is also a section on Education and Career including certification and training, job hunting and legal issues for engineers. Many of these pages could be very useful to a Penn State engineer looking for scholarships or financial aid as well as resume building and mentoring programs. Using the search bar is the best way to find a specific topic or subject on the website. By searching internships a page about technical internships in the renewable energy sector appears. On this page is a summary of what it means to have that position as well as companies that offers positions in that field. Using the search bar is by far the best way to find specific information. The search can be narrowed by selecting standards, events, jobs, courses, articles or many other options. The site contains many articles about recent achievements or events in the engineering community. This site could be very useful for research on a specific topic or just to gain a broader understanding of current advances in the field of mechanical engineering. There is also a directory of people and groups involved with the ASME, which can also be found using the search bar and selecting either people or groups from the drop down menu. 5

3.0 Homework Help 3.1 Chegg Study Website Home Page: www.chegg.com Study Section: www.chegg.com/study Chegg is one of the leading online textbook rental and purchasing service, but also has a lot of information on available jobs, college search engine and even a page to help users find scholarships. The site is very easy to navigate and has great heading at the top of the page for users to easily find what they are looking for. This guide will focus more specifically on the Study section of the website. Chegg contains step-by-step solutions for other 3000 textbooks and has an in-depth discussion board for extra help. However Chegg is a paid service, for either $14.95/month or $99.95/year. Many students are wary of spending extra money especially with the high cost of tuition and textbooks, but it is definitely worth the price. The annual price is about the same or even cheaper than a typically engineering textbook, and the subscription lasts the course of 2 semesters. There are solutions to virtually all textbooks used by Penn State including those for Math, Physics, Chemistry and all disciplines of engineering. Chegg recently introduced a service where a user can be connected with an online tutor almost instantly. Chegg allows the 120 minutes of service free of charge, after that there is an hourly rate. This feature could be useful for those users still needing extra help understanding material, when the professor is unavailable. Use the search bar! A user can type in the partial name of a textbook and view all the different editions available with step-by-step solutions. The search bar can also process inquiries for textbooks, solutions or just general questions and return very accurate results. Solutions have a rating by users, grading how correct the information is. Beware sometimes the solutions are incorrect, but that is only a small fraction. There is the ability to comment on the solutions so usually the correct solution can be found there. The textbook solutions are available through ios and android as well so that they may be accessed without the need of a computer. 6

3.2 Engineering Toolbox Website Home Page: http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com The Engineering Toolbox is a website designed to provide relevant information on all aspects and related aspects of engineering. The left hand side of the page has a list of categories including acoustics, mathematics, thermodynamics and a variety of other engineering topics. By clicking on a subject in the left hand side list, it opens a page with links to over 100 different topics within that particular subject. For example by going under Mechanics and then Acceleration of Gravity and Newton s Second Law there is a learning module describing how gravity works and the difference between mass and weight. The page is full of useful equations, proper units, graphs and charts, and tons of example problems. And at the bottom of the page is related topics and related documents the user may be interested in. This particular page is only one of the thousands of pages this website contains. There is also a search bar on the website which claims to be the best way to navigate the site. By simply searching Inertia the site returns over 200 results including an Area Moment of Inertia Calculator, a general page about inertia and links to all topics that use the property of inertia. The sire also contains an abundance of unit converters and calculators, which eliminates the need to do trivial calculations and conversions. The site also includes a complete 3D modeling feature to make models of parts and simulate their use. Overall this site is a wealth of information and convenience for any engineering student struggling with a topic. Definitely use the search bar when navigating the site, in order to narrow down search to exactly what is desired. Make use of the Apps page located in the top left corner. This page contains all the functional calculator and unit convertors in one place. This can be a very big time saver when performing a series of trivial calculations during a homework assignment. This site has information for any engineering class at Penn State, and can help students understand a concept that may not have been fully grasped in class. 7

4.0 Research Materials 4.1 The Statistical Abstract of the United States Government Database Home Page: www.census.gov The Statistical Abstract of the United States is the authoritative and comprehensive summary of the political, economic and social organization of the United States. This database literally has statistics on any relevant aspect of the United States, which are broken up into categories listed down the left hand side of the page. Hovering over the topic shows subtopics and when those are clicked a list of documents pertaining to certain statistics are available. Information on the site could be useful to learn more about the engineering job market, average salary of a graduate or even for research purposes. Under the Energy & Utilities: Solar and Renewable Energy, Emissions relevant information about energy consumption by source, summary of ethanol and biodiesel use, and solar collector shipments can be found. The document Renewable Energy Consumption Estimates by Source has information about renewable energy consumptions by residential, commercial, industrial, transportation and electric power. It also breaks up each category into what specific renewable energy source is used. This article could be very useful to a student doing research about how Penn State could be more green by trying to find which renewable fuel source used to power a building. There is a search feature if the user is trying to find a specific piece of information. The search bar is located in the top right corner of the homepage. More topics are available apart from those listed on the left hand side. These can be found by clicking on Index A-Z in the top right corner above the search bar. 8

4.2 Catalog of U.S. Government Publications Government Database Home Page: http://catalog.gpo.gov/f?rn=938939732 The catalog of U.S. Government Publications (CGP) is a finding tool for publications from all branches of the U.S. government. It contains more than 500,000 records since 1976 and is updated daily. The website has a general search engine that returns all relevant documents to keyword, author subject or title. An advanced search is also available which features the option to find by year, format, language and specific catalogs. A simple search of Penn State Engineering returns a plethora of documents about research done at Penn State or that involved Penn State professors. One article in particular Marine hydrokinetic turbine powertake-off design for optimal performance and low impact on cost-of-energy is a report done by Penn State that is available for immediate online viewing. This particle article is about hydrokinetic devices which are able to harness energy from moving water. This is a great example of a current event or particular project an undergraduate student could be interested in. The website is rather straightforward and easy to navigate. A broad search can be rather overwhelming, but the search can be narrowed by a variety of methods through the Advanced tab at the top of the page. The Advanced tab also has a list of tips towards the bottom of the page. It contains many useful facts for the user on how to efficiently and effectively find exactly what they are looking for. 9

4.3 ASME Digital Collection Electronic Index Home Page: http://www.asmedigitalcollection.asme.org Free through the Penn State Library: Go to www.psu.edu Click on libraries then libraries home Click on Databases By Title Click on ASME Digital Collection and enter your Penn State id and password ASME Digital Collection database provides full text access to the American Society of Mechanical Engineer s online journals since 1960 and conference papers since 2002 as well as E-books on a variety of topics. The database has a contents bar at the top of the page below the search bar, which is organized by journals, conference proceedings, e-books or by separated by topics. The search feature is actually pretty useful but could be slightly overwhelming. For example, searching automotive returns over 4500 results on all documents containing the word automotive, however there are features to help refine the search. On the left hand side results can be narrowed by publication type: Journals, Proceedings and ebooks. The automotive results can be narrowed by topics such as: design, stress, engine, manufacturing and many other practical areas of the automotive industry. The database included a variety of different engineering journals which could be useful for finding recent news and developing technology of a specific field. By using the Topic Collection tab, then choosing specific topic, a reader can view recent article published in relevant journals. The articles are listed by title so a reader can choose which article is pertinent to their inquiry. For overall use the search bar is probably the most comprehensive feature because of the ability to narrow down the search. A reader can quickly and easily find a wealth of information and publications about a very specific topic. 10

4.4 Journal of Mechanical Design Electronic Journal Home Page: http://mechanicaldesign.asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/journal.aspx?journalid=126 The ASME Journal of Mechanical Design (JMD) provides scholarly research in all aspects of the design process, focusing on design synergy, to the entire community of engineers. The journal contains most in depth research articles, but also communicates technical briefs, design innovations papers, book reviews and editorials. It is possible to view previous and current issues of the journal as well accepted manuscripts and articles published ahead of print. Each issue of the journal has a table of contents that outlines the title of the articles and provides a brief summary. The user can also view a stream of articles either by Newest Articles or Popular Content if they aren t looking for specific content or just want to see what trending. On the right hand side of the page there is an abstract about the journal, the scope and a list of external links to: submit paper, author resources, permissions, announcements, etc This journal could be very useful to an undergraduate student wanting to learn more about the design process for a class like ME 340 or ME 440. Both those classes are semester long design projects, which could greatly benefit from information found in this journal. In order to search for information within the journal the main search bar must be used. Then the user has to narrow the search to the journal they are interested in. The journal is part of the ASME Digital Collection, which contains a number of journals, articles and conference proceedings. If the information cannot be found in this particular journal there are options to search in other journals or just conduct a general search of the entire index. 11