The Engineering Design Process (8/7/15)

Remember, the engineering design process is a specific set of steps that engineers use to organize their ideas and refine potential solutions to engineering challenges. Who remembers all of the steps? The steps include: identify the need, research the problem, develop possible solutions, select the most promising solution, construct a prototype, test and evaluate the prototype, communicate the design, and redesign.

Following this process, we start out by identifying the need for our engineering project. Instead of asking "what do we want to design?" we ask "why do we want to design that?" and "what problem and or need will our design ultimately be solving?"

Next, we want to identify our target population, which is the group of people who will benefit from our project. Is the target population ultimately one individual, a group of individuals, a specific community, or a larger, identifiable population? Is the target population from a specific location (country, region, town), demographic (age or gender), or other identifying characteristics (health condition or employment)? How is our target population connected?

After we understand our project need and our target population, we will identify our project's requirements and constraints. A requirement is a need or a necessity; it's what a particular product or service should do. A constraint is a restriction on the degree of freedom you have in providing a solution to a need or problem. For example, you may be required by your parents to receive good grades. At the same time, you may be constrained by other activities such as work, sports, sleep, spending time with friends, and so on. Although worthwhile, these time constraints may impinge on the amount of time you have to study. So, your challenge would be to find out how to meet the requirement of receiving good grades under the given time constraints.

Put simply, engineers follow a series of steps called the “engineering design process."

ASK: What is the problem? How have others approached it? What are your constraints?

IMAGINE: What are some solutions? Brainstorm ideas. Choose the best one.

PLAN: Draw a diagram. Make lists of materials you will need.

CREATE: Follow your plan and create something. Test it out!

IMPROVE: What works? What doesn't? What could work better? Modify your designs to make it better. Test it out!