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Branch LinksIEEE Privacy PolicyDaytona IEEE Section March 26th, 2020 Technical/Dinner Meeting On Thursday March 26th, 2020, the
Daytona Section's March meeting will be held
at the Halifax River Yatch Club at 321 South
Beach Street in Daytona Beach Florida. The
guest speaker will be Dr. Al Helfrick,
Professor Emeritus at Embry-Riddle
Aeronautical University. Professor Al
indicates that he has no idea what he will be
talking about. But we know it will be
interesting and the worth the energy to
attend.
Dr. Al Helfrick started his career in radiation hardening of military systems, then after a stint in the military (including a tour of duty in Vietnam), continued in the fields of cable television, test and measurements, avionics and finally as an independent consultant. Dr. Helfrick joined ERAU in 1991 and retired in 2015 after serving as both a professor and department chairman. He is still active in academia, continues to publish and present papers at conferences, and occasionally regales audiences with reminiscences from his career. More information on
directions to the meeting venue and the
menu for the dinner can be found on the
Calander of Events page on the
webpage.
Daytona IEEE Section February 19th, 2020 Technical/Dinner Meeting On Wednesday February 19th, 2020, the Daytona Section's February meeting was held in conjunction with Embry-Riddle's celebration of Engineering Week. In place of regular meeting, they attended the February 19th keynote address at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University delivered by Tamaira Ross. Ms. Ross is Blue Origin's Configuration Design Engineer and Manager. The presentation is sponsored by the College of Engineering and the Honors Program at ERAU. Ms. Ross is leading the system definition and design for Blue Origin's New Glenn orbital launch vehicle program. Formerly, she was a technical fellow in the Boeing Company's Defenses, Space and Security business unit. In her presentation, Ms. Ross discussed the parallels between commercial aviation and commercial space as she reflected on her extensive career at Boeing and Blue Origin. According to Ross, the commercial space industry aims to emulate the arc of the commercial airline industry by increasing the life of vehicles, reducing operations and maintenance cost, and increasing the number and types of customers. The drive to reduce cost influences the the design of both aircraft and launch vehicles and the systems in which they operate. A more detailed description of the technical topic, and
the speakers
background can
be found on
the Recent
Event page on this website.
Computer Society Chapter of the IEEE Daytona
Section
For
information on the Computer Society
Chapter of the IEEE Daytona Section,
contact Dr. Keith Garfield at
Newsletter
Available on Line
On this website the current copy of the "Sparks" newsletter will be provided by clicking on Sparks Newsletter at the top of this page. Copies of the newsletter for the past several years are available by clicking on the Newsletter Archives at the top of this page, and then selecting the appropriate newsletter from the archives by date. Internet
Address Shortcut
At the
suggestion of several members of the Section the web
master requested an alias web site address from IEEE
Headquarters. For people with short memories we
can now be reached on our old web address https://www.ewh.ieee.org/r3/daytona or our new alias
address: https://www.ieee.org/go/daytona
IEEE-USA .
Webmaster
Charles Husbands
chusbands@ieee.org Updated 12 March 2020 |
Welcome to the Daytona Section of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). Daytona
IEEE Section
Life Members Affinity Group Technical Tour October 15, 2019 The Daytona Section of the IEEE Life Members Affinity Group, held a guided tour at their meeting on Tuesday October 15th, 2019. It was a guided tour of the St. Augustine Lighthouse conducted by one of the Lighthouse "Keepers." The meeting was held at the St. Augustine, Florida lighthouse at 100 Red Cox Road, St. Augustine, Florida. The tour was a great success and was enjoyed by the members taking part in the guided tour. Daytona IEEE Section Life Members Affinity Group Technical Tour April 2, 2019 The Life Members Affinity Group toured the manufacturing facility of American Radionics Co. Inc. (AMRAD) on April 2, 2019. Vice President Richard Stockman hosted our tour with participation from other senior staff. AMRAD make large capacitors using a thin film of polypropylene as the dielectric. They have devised a simple, yet elegant, method for making at least seven capacitors in one casing. They target markets where they can "make a difference" and be competitive with off-shore manufactures. They continue to devise new solutions for special markets. They build most of the manufacturing tools themselves, with the exception of the web handling tools that wind the capacitors. They have very good quality control throughout the facility and their product is extremely stable. They test the product well above its specific ratings. We really appreciated the superb tour, discussions regarding their production processes, and talking with their laboratory people. Company management went out of their way to give us a superb tour and a well spent afternoon. Daytona
IEEE Section
Life Members Affinity Group Technical Tour December 6, 2018 The Life
Members Affinity Group toured the manufacturing
facility of Everglades Boats in Edgewater on
December 6, 2018. Our tour guide (James) was
outstanding. He obviously knew his
way around the manufacturing facility and was an
outstanding advocate for Everglade Boats.
Manufacturing begins with the foming of two fiberglass hulls - an outside hull and an inner hull and they are permanently fastened together with a confidential material and process. This results in a hull that is over an inch thick and very strong. The seats, cabin, roof and other fittings are all assembled to the hull, usually with screw or bolt fasteners. In several places a heavy sheet of aluminum is embedded in the casting so that it can be drilled and threaded for bolts. Watching the workers and verified by James, there is a lot of hand word, which requires substantial skills in working with the fiberglass. Fortunately, the operators made their tasks look easy. Everglades builds some 350 boats a year spread over approximately 15 different models. So a automation would probably not pay. All this boats are powered with outboard engines. The individual models have a choice of several engine sizes and can have from one to four such engines. Until recently, their biggest engine put out 350 hp and weighed over 800 pounds. How they have the option of a 425 hp Engine that weights just over 1000 lbs. Even their 43 ft. model will be able to do 50 miltes per hour with these engines. With that amount of power and speed, each engine will consume 25 gal of per hour. Throughout the manufacturing process, a lot of attention is paid to quality control. At the end of the line, each boat is given a through going over. They even have a pool where every boat is tested, including the motors, before it is shipped. We had a great tour and concluded that Everglades builds a good solid high quality product.
The Life Members Affinity Group
arranged for a short presentation and a tour of the
Burns STEM school in Oak Hill on Tuesday, February 20
(Engineers week starts Feb. 19). The tour, took about
one hour, and started at 11:00 a.m. After the tour the
group went to Goodrich's restaurant (on the river) for
lunch.
The Burns
Charter school opened in August 2011, with an
enrollment of 240 children. The school is housed
in an elementary school facility that was closed
by the school district circa 2009. The local
community formed working groups to find a way to
re-open their neighborhood school and the Burns
STEM school servicing kindergarten through grade 8
was the result. They now have 450 students – the
maximum the site will handle. They have achieved
an A rating from the State of Florida. Last spring they were
certified
K-8 STEM.
The tour went very well and everyone who attended commented of structure of the education process and amount of technology inserted into the school's curriculum. It was suggested that we examine a process where the LM Group might provide mentoring support to the school.
and Coffee Mugs We are pleased to offer
Daytona Section polo shirts and coffee mugs for
our Section members. Shirt's are embroidered
with the IEEE logo and Daytona Section on the left
and your name and grade, if desired, on the right.
For additional size, contact and pricing
information please see the article in the latest
version of the Sparks
Newsletter.
Specifications and
prices for the Coffee Mugs are also available
in the same publication.
The objective of the
Small Radio Telescope Program was to acquire and
operate a small radio telescope in support of a
comprehensive educational and research
program. This program was directed at
increasing the understanding of science and
electrical engineering in the local schools and
universities of the greater Daytona Area.
In early 2007 a grant
application was submitted by the Daytona IEEE
Section to the IEEE Life Member Committee (LMC) to
provide funding for a Small Radio Telescope (SRT)
Program.
The SRT Program was designed to acquire, assemble and calibrate a small radio telescope to be used for teaching radio astronomy, electronics, communications, antenna theory, and data processing. The device is to be used to support the teaching of these technologies at the University Level, High School and Middle School Level, and provide workshops to home schooled students. In
February of 2008 the Small Radio Telescope
(SRT) Program, funded by the IEEE Life Member
Committee, placed the initial purchase orders
necessary to obtain a commercial small radio
telescope instrument.
In late 2008 and
early 2009 the SRT was assembled in the High
Bay Laboratory and Embry-Riddle Aeronautical
University. During this period initial
tracking and calibration testing was
performed.
In
late February 2009 the completed SRT system
was delivered to the Daytona Museum of Arts
and Sciences (MOAS). On 21 February 2009
the system was demonstrated to the Life
Members Committee (LMC) who had funded the
program.
In early April 2009 the antenna system
was mounted on a 20 foot mast at the Museum of
Arts and Sciences and integrated into the
planetarium's control console position. With the antenna installed in
the museum's planetarium a series of detailed
tests were run prior to integrating it into the
planetarium program.
During November
2009 a small team of engineers from
Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University examined
the existing SRT software interfaces and
modified them to make it more user friendly
and more meaningful to potential users.
In early 2010 hardware and software were installed to permit the SRT to be remotely operated to extend its application for research and educational purposes. This modification allowed the SRT is available to researchers and educators, from any location, in the world, that has internet access. A prototype website with the URL https://www.daytonaSRT.org was developed to permit a gateway to the SRT to allow operation of the small radio telescope for research and educational purposes. Photos and a detailed
description of the development and testing
phase of the small radio telescope
installation can be found on the SRT
Program section of this website
On March 19, 2011 a
conference paper "Development of a
Small Radio Telescope for Engineering
Education" was presented at
SoutheastCon2011. The paper was
authored by Charles Husbands, Dr. William
Barott, and Jeanette Barott. Copies of
this paper are available through the IEEE
Xplorer Network or can be obtained, for
personal use, by contacting the
authors. The authors all appear on the
Section
Officers Page of this website.
The SRT is current out of service as the antenna structure had be relocated due to construction at the museum. We are examining new sites for the antenna system and hope to have it up and operational for educational purposes in the near future.
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