The ENES220 I-beam design project is a staple in the UMD engineering curriculum. It involves teamwork, hands-on construction, and engineering optimization. I worked with a team of five students during this project. I delegated tasks, calculated expected beam loads, and created a spreadsheet to optimize the dimensions of the beam. This project came with many constraints that specified a max width, max width to thickness ratio, and range that all loads must fall under. After successfully designing and constructing a beam within the constraints, we tested it using a 3-point bend test.

This was one of my favorite projects in the UMD engineering curriculum so far. I loved using Excel to optimize the beam dimensions to support as much load as possible. I first defined all relevant equations in Excel and linked cells to each other where necessary. This allowed me to play around with the beam dimensions at the top of the sheet and see an immediate result in the graphs to the right. There were many constraints in this project, so optimization was necessary. I would be interested in exploring more challenging optimization problems in the future.