01.01.15
MMU-Alstom live rail project
Source: Rail Technology Magazine Dec/Jan 2015
Sam McCaffrey reports on how a leading rail company is getting design input from engineering students.
In 2013, the engineering department at Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) teamed up with engineers at Alstom to give students the opportunity to work on a challenge set by a professional firm.
The joint project is beginning to hit its stride. This year’s iteration has third year BSc (Hons) Computer & Network Technology students from the university working on designing a new 3G monitoring system to be integrated in the inside of a train, and RTM was invited along to see how the project is going and to hear from the students.
Lecturer Dr Ciaron Murphy explained: “Alstom treat this as if they’re outsourcing something to us, and the students need to treat Alstom as their client and come up with a design for the challenge.
“The students present their project outlines to Alstom, who give them feedback and then the students go away and build it and get a prototype ready. Then they pitch it again to Alstom in an attempt to get them to approve their prototype.”
Dr Murphy called the collaboration “invaluable” in terms of professional experience. He said: “It gives them the experience of how these projects would work in the real world, where if someone is paying their wage they will have to work to what the client wants rather then what they think is best. The students want a job at the end of the day, that’s what they’re doing the degree for, and this looks great on the CV.”
The system Alstom wants the students to design needs to be able to monitor different digital, analogue and serial inputs such as vibration and temperature data. It needs to be able to log the systems data with time and be able to transmit the data through ethernet or 3G and be accessible via a handheld, Android-based display unit capable of displaying a graphical summary of the data.
“This project meets a real need for us,” said Beatriz Escarta-Claveria, systems engineer at Alstom. “We need something that will be plug-and-play – put it there and monitor it and then extract the data and do some trend analysis and algorithms to see what’s happening with the train.”
But if it’s a real need why have students do it? Artiom Gertner, a graduate software engineer from Alstom, explained: “Projects for students typically meet two criteria: what would be nice to do and what don’t we have the resources to do? If some project would be nice-to-have, but it’s a bit too minor to invest money into it, or maybe we just don’t have time or engineers to do it – well, why not give it to students to have a go?”
The students were excited to have the opportunity. Liam Miller, one of the third year students involved, said having a real-world problem to try to solve was particularly interesting. He told RTM: “It made me more creative because I want to think of more ideas and try to impress the company. It’s going to give me an ‘edge’ on future projects and help me think out of the box and make something different that somebody is actually going to want to buy.”
He said he was excited about the possibility of impressing Alstom, and potentially arranging a work experience opportunity or even a job with the company.
Escarta-Claveria said: “We like to collaborate with local communities and universities. For them it’s a good project, to see how the industry is – but this works both ways. For us, we can see which of the graduates are good, what skills they have and we can also mentor them to suit those skills needed in the industry.”
Gertner added: “I’ve been on the other side of it: I’ve been offered a job after doing a university project for a company, so I can say the schematic works.”
Tell us what you think – have your say below or email [email protected]