Engineering Capstone Design of a Radio Telescope

This paper presents an engineering capstone design project that is community or service-based. By and large, most students in the school's capstone program design and build a car for competition in the Baja or Formula collegiate program. However, there are several other growing options that students are exploring. In 2019-20, one of the options was for students to design and build a star tracking mechanism for a 4.5-meter radio telescope. This paper presents the ongoing telescope work and, where appropriate, contrasts that with the traditional capstone projects like Baja. In particular, a series 8345 Prime focus radio telescope is to be modified to track stars. This means that we could use the 8345-dish, but little else. Nearly every component of the telescope system had to be reengineered and constructed. The instrument collection device will be modified to scan the sky using the hydrogen line. The telescope is to be placed at the John C. Rudy Park, in York County Pennsylvania and operated by the York Astronomical Society (YAS). The mount was to include both azimuth and elevation tracking with remote control from a website. The park service was to handle the details surrounding the foundation, fencing, control room, and power; however, the college ended up providing these features as well. This paper details the design and construction of the telescope's mechanical components by the students. This Project Based Learning (PBL) course allows the students to manage the design process with minimal input from the instructors. How we did this should be of interest to others wanting to try the same techniques. While there is considerable structure to the program, students are encouraged to manage and run the program based on what they have learned in the past three to four years at the college. Nonetheless, some faculty assistance was required for this program and we discuss the benefits and drawbacks of these interactions. Additionally, the course's design helps promote Self-Regulated Learning (SRL) and Life-Long Learning (L3) of the students. The academic advisors overseeing the work served more in a mentoring role than as project managers. Not surprisingly, this project had numerous financial and engineering constraints to include the difficulties surrounding a 1-ton telescope and rotating mechanisms being operated in a public park atop a 9-foot pole. These constraints necessitated both student and faculty grant applications. Furthermore, the paper details the design and solution to some of the more difficult manufacturing limitations of the college's facilities. Finally, the paper discusses the educational value of this project's approach along with the social and environmental issues that needed to be overcome.

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