On Friday, I got my first ticket for the stupidest reasons. My friends and I decided to go to Thai House, one of the best places in Prescott when it comes to Thai Food. I was pretty exhausted after taking classes till 4 PM so I was ready for some good food. We got our food and on the way back we were listening to some good music, cracking some jokes and just having a good time. While driving on Willow Creek Road, the traffic was pretty slow on the fast lane outside Fry’s because of a left turn. So, I changed lanes and a cop was in front of me. After 10 seconds of changing lanes, the cop changes lanes and is behind me and flashes his light. I find the nearest right turn and park. After a minute or two, the cop comes up to me and asks ” So, how much distance should you keep when going 40 mph?” I was pretty freaked out because I had no clue why he pulled me over. I said maybe a car length or two. Well, it is “actually a car length for every 10 mph”. So, I was supposed to be four car lengths away from his car!!!!

He asked for my insurance and registration. I handed it to him and he took his sweet time. After like 15-20 minutes, he comes up with a citation with 2 violations:

1. “Driving to close” ( Bad English, but that is what he wrote)

2. “Failure to provide evidence of insurance”

Apparently, I handed him the wrong insurance ID. I got a new one this February. I had the old and the new one in my car and I accidentally handed him the wrong one when he asked for it, in the beginning. However, I told him that I had the new one in the front and I was reaching out for it. He tells me, ” Don’t worry about it, court will handle it” How much more ridiculous can this get? That is a total fine of $265. $165 for the ‘driving to close’ and $100 for ‘failure to provide evidence of insurance’.

Today, I went to the court to contest the citations. I showed the lady at the counter my insurance and she wiped off the insurance citation and I have a hearing on the 20th of April about the ‘driving to close’ citation. Let us see how much more ridicolus this can get.

Will keep you guys updated!Feel free to comment about some instances that you guys have faced with the traffic tickets!

As a side note, Manchester United’s loss to Bayern Munich was annoying to say the least. I was at the lower hangar watching the Red Devils keeping that 1-0 lead for what seemed forever, and then comes Olin crashing in at the last minute!! What happened in the last minute is unbelievable and now Rooney is injured and we play Chelsea this weekend. Great timing! This is going to be a very interesting season ahead. Glory Man Utd!

My next semester classes are going to be awesome and I am pretty stoked about them. I finally get to do those things that I have been waiting for all this time.

Here it is:

AE_495R_01PC

Fundamentals of Wind Energy

L. Traub

MA_441_

Math Methods for Engineers

H. Tsutsui

AE_430_01PC

Control System Analysis

K. Bordignon

AE_413_01PC

Airplane Stability & Control

K. Bordignon

AE_315_50PC

Experimental Aerodynamics Lab

L. Traub

AE_314_01PC

Experimental Aerodynamics

L. Traub

AE_302_01PC

Aerodynamics II

L. Traub

The class “Fundamentals of Wind Energy” is a technical elective taught by Dr. Traub this semester for the first time. It is definitely going to be a very interesting class just like the Introduction to Engineering Optimization that I am taking this semester. It is really funny that I also got to see a full size win turbine blade on my way to the camp during Spring break. It was huge maybe even more than 300 ft!!! I made some futile attempts to get some pictures from my cell phone L

The class I am most excited about is Experimental Aerodynamics! I would love to spend all day working for this class. Working in the wind tunnel, getting models ready for testing, writing papers about it, coming up with amazing ideas for experiments/research, sanding balsa wood, creating models for water tunnel: the possibilities are endless and so much fun! I will get to use my skills and knowledge from other classes and apply it to projects related to aerodynamics!

I will also be studying supersonic flow in Aerodynamics II. Right now, I am studying about subsonic and incompressible flows. For the curious minded, subsonic is below the speed of sound and incompressible is a flow that has no change in density. They are related as such as a rule of thumb: incompressible flow is flow below Mach 0.3. J Some engineering knowledge J

I would be studying about differentials and other hardcore math topics in Math 441. It is the last mathematics class required. I would also get to make a glider in the Airplane Stability and Control class with Dr. Bordignon.

I am stoked! Ask me questions, if any, and I would be more than happy to help.

The long awaited spring break started for me on Friday. I gladly switched off my phone alarm and went back to sleep with a smile. 🙂

However, a call at 9:10 shattered all my dreams. My friend, Raj, called me up and asked if I am not giving my Electrical Engineering Exam. With a panic, I gathered myself and rushed to the school in my pajamas. I reached the classroom by 9:30 AM and the exam was almost half way through. I had 30 minutes left to take a one hour exam.

I think I still did well in that exam. After the last class at 4 PM, I went to Raj’s room and spend some time just chilling and taking some time off from studies. 2 nights ago, it snowed so badly that there was no way I could drive back home and thus, had to stay on campus.

On Saturday morning, I left to the airport along with Raj, Sreyes and Praful in the morning. I had a whole day to spend at the airport and get bored. But, that didn’t happen. All hail free Wi-Fi and Pandora. While all of my friends were off to Las Vegas, I was to the amazing Oklahoma City. I was also going to spend 4 days in a Christian camp. What better to do during Spring break, right? Yeah, I was pretty bummed as well.

I reached my cousin’s home by 10 PM and slept for some time, watched movies and had fun, a lot of fun. Next day, I met all my friends at church and also went for a home game against the Utah Jazz team.

On Monday, I played some pool with my cousin and for the first time, he beat me twice, in a row. Well, things happen. 🙁 After that, we spent some time at Walmart finding some cables to watch movies. It was a time well spent because I finally found some time to watch some Hindi movies.

The next few days, I just relaxed and rested at the home getting enough sleep, for a change. I also got to spend some time with my great friends and cousins at the mall and other places.

On Thursday afternoon, we left for the camps at Falls Creek, Oklahoma. It was said to be the biggest campsite and it was pretty amazing. They had a lake at the camp site! The first day was pretty relaxing and we had a session as well along with some good dinner. The only bad thing was no cell phone reception!! 4 days without the phone and internet was not good especially when you open up the inboxes to 40 new mail messages!

Friday and Saturday had four sessions and all were very informative and beneficial to my life. On Sunday, we had a wrap up session and went back home. I had my flight at 6 PM and reached home at 4 PM. So, I had to rush through my packing and reach airport at the right time. I didn’t felt like coming back at all. One was home sickness and the other was AE 304- Aircraft Structures 1 homework. I slept all the way to the house: a total of 4 hours in the plane and shuttle.

Anyways, life goes on and another late night is waiting for me. It is still fun though, each problem is very interesting and doing homework turns out to be a little bit fun, actually.

In my next post, I will try to cover my next semester schedule and things I would possible do in the summer and try to convince you why I am stoked.

I have been feeling really low for a week now. I think I got the flu initially. I had high temperatures and head-splitting headaches. To worsen it, it happened during the snow days. We got two of them last week on Thursday and Friday, thus a four day weekend as well. Except Dave, everyone at the house went to Flagstaff on Thu. The weather was so bad; they couldn’t come back till Saturday.

All that time, I was taking Tylenol, Thermaflu, Ibuprofin and a lot of fluids. I got done with a 24 pack Gatorade in 3 days. It was bad. L I went to the healthness center after four days of torture and self care. The doctor said I am on the way to getting better, so things should be fine in a day or two. Yeah, right. For two days, I am not able to eat anything. Nothing stays down. Hopefully, some more self care should solve it in a day or two.

To add to the pain, there was a structures quiz and HW. I managed to get the online quiz right but I was in no way capable of completing that HW. I bombed it real bad. I went to the Optimization class and found that the homework is postponded!!! What? There was homework? So, now I need to get done an upper level math course HW in a day. That is going to be great fun to watch.

Anyways, being sick alone taught me some things.

Real friends are very few.

They will help you when you need it, not when you tell them.

Don’t take medicines when the stomach is empty (I didn’t know that!).

Sometimes you just need to rest.

It made me think some of my long term goals and I have decided to graduate in 7 semesters! That is a whole semester of savings. However, I will also miss Riddle sooner L L

Let’s hope for the best! God bless you all!!

Last semester was really busy. So I couldn’t right a lot. Anyways, this is what happened last semester in short: Lots of studies. I was taking the Gauntlet.

Here at ERAU, we, Aerospace Engineers lovingly ( not! he he) call the combination of the three classes : Fluid Mechanics, Solid Mechanics and Dynamics as the Gauntlet. These are the first engineering course in which you use math and every other skill needed for good engineering. It is the first step towards taking higher level classes.

Things I learned:

1. Gauntlet is manageable. It is actually pretty much up to you. Don’t listen to people worrying about it, just hear it and forget.

2. You will have to sacrifice a lot of things like watching TV all weekend long or playing pool at the Union for long times. You know what takes the most time out of your day. Change it and you will be fine.

3. For every hour spend in class,  expect to spend two hours outside of class. That is what most of our professors told us. It is definitely true. So, that is like a max. of 36 hours a week and a week has 168 hours.

4. You will fail the course if you pile up the homework. These courses are homework intensive so manage time accordingly and you will see that you will be cruising through with ease

5. You don’t need to be a math genius to ace these classes, just don’t hate math. Solidfy your trig and calculus, and you will be doing just fine.

6. Keep up the spirit. Probably, it would be best if you attempt all questions yourself and then, have a study group to confirm answers and address problems and thus help each other as well.

A lot of things are different this semester for me.

The bads:

• I cannot wake up 10 minutes before class and still be on time.
• Outtakes is no longer there to kill my midnight, post-homework completion hunger.
• Parking spot is harder to find especially when I am late for the 8:00 am Fluids class.
• Sometimes, being late means no lunch. 🙁
• Less free time.

The good:

• I make my own food, great food.
• I have my own room. The guitar, the laptop, the airplanes and the music, everything feels better. 🙂
• I can kill zombies, play Tekken and fail epicly in NHL whenever I want to.
• The Badminton Court in the back yard is just great.
• I have a car now. I have a garage now.
• Playing with a Border Collie makes everything better.

Enough talking, let the pictures talk. 🙂

1st Day: The Orientation was headed by Dona and all the camp coordinators. We had a total of 3 FE Camps during this summer. Alpha, Bravo and Charlie.

After the orientation, we had the ball game going on for an hour or so. Close to 9 PM, we took them to Walmart and the day was ended at 10 PM.

2nd day: Every pilot needs to go through the basic ground school instructions before they can actually fly. This day was filled with classes educating the student about the ground school, proper safety measures followed and what to look forward to with respect to the weather conditions.

3rd day: Students went flying today. They did a short flight today along with an instructor. The students were ecstatic and they were waiting for this moment for a long time now. After the flying, the students had another class on Weather. It was pretty informative. Dr. Curtis talked about how clouds are formed.

4th day: Students completed their night flight. Everyone had their cameras armed to take the best shot of the Grand Canyon. The fun seems to never ebb but increase. I called this day as the flying day. It was probably the only day where they didn’t have to take a class. During the free time, we played Kickball and Dodgeball.

5th day: We took the students today to the Lookheed Martin aviation branch in Prescott. The students were given some critical information that every pilot should know but generally tends to ignore. After a cross country flight, the students were taken to both a dinner and a movie. We had our dinner at Chili’s. After the dinner, all of us went for a movie at the Harkin’s Theatres. This was surely a tiring day.

6th day: Today the camp ended with the Grad Luncheon. The students were provided with a certificate for completing the camp. This was the last camp of this summer. After everything was over, I started packing my stuff to move to the new house. David, one of my roomates, would show up in a week and hopefully things will get more interesting.

I finally managed to get my driving license as well. Now, all I need is a car. 🙂

This year, I will be renting a house with my roomate and two of my friends. It is sure going to be very interesting and loads of fun! Keep watch for my next blog post. 🙂

This week we started off with the CE Camp.

1st day:

We had an orientation where everyone was introduced. Prof. Tarek El Dokor was also there to introduce the students the concept of this camp and how interesting the field of computers can be, only if one is ready to make the efforts. After the dinner and some games, the students were back at the dorms. Later that day, they were taken to Wal-Mart to get anything they were missing.

2nd day:

They had a lot of time with Prof. Tarek El Dokor to learn about C ++. All the class time was focused on covering this computer language. Most of these classes took place in Academics 1 building. After an exhaustive day in the class room, the students had free time from 6 pm to 10 pm. Thus started the huge game of dodgeball. At 10 pm, lights were out and the students were excited for the next day for classes that included Machine Vision Lab.

3rd day:

A lot of information on the Machine Vision Lab can be found on the college website. I only know a quantum of what it is all about. Students got to play around with the Machine Vision Lab and also to understand the concept behind this endeavor. They also had classes on ‘Programming Mastermind” and ” Stenography and Watermarking”. Everyone was stoked about the next day because they would be going on a road trip to Sedona, hike a lot and get a bit of respite from classes.

4th day:

Pics say it all. We hiked Sugarloaf Trail and West Fork Oak Creek Trail. We also stopped at Basha’s between the two trails to refuel our supplies.

5th day:

A class with Randy Shaffer started their day and it was the best start they could have. This class talked about Electronics and Robotics and they got to ‘blow stuff up’. After a trip to Admissions Office and the Bookstore, they spent their free time chilling in the swimming pool. During the evening, they went for dinner at Garcia’s and a movie at Harkins Theaters at Prescott Valley.

6th day:

The camp wrapped up with a graduation luncheon at Academic 1 Atrium and tours around the campus.

As usual, pictures and videos follow:

The 4^th day started off with Dr. Traub and Dr. Ashworth teaching the students the basics of aerodynamics and airplane construction. A wind tunnel lab followed in which the principles of wind tunnel and the theories behind its working were explained. The students also checked out the water tunnel and the various airplane models built by seniors for their ‘Detail’ Design class from previous semesters. After lunch, the same teachers continued their classes on Stability and Control. The students were introduced the four basic forces acting on an airplane and how each of them contributes to the stability of the airplane. Drag is not always a bad thing 😉 After all these classes were complete, the fun began. The students entered the machine shops and looked at a pile of balsa wood, stacks of glue, rubber-band packets, sets of rulers and pencils, lots of X-Acto knives and knew exactly how much fun they are going to have for the next 2.5 hours. Spilt in teams of four, the campers began the design process. A plethora of designs were made:highly tapered wings, high aspect ratio wings, stepped wings, unique empennage configurations and lots of unique construction ideas. The students were designing this airplane with an engineering aspect in mind. It was not a thumb-measured-airplane made at the backyard. Carefully measured cuts were made whenever possible and the weight was always an issue. Some groups got to complete the design before the allotted time and got to do some flight test in the corridors of the AxFab Building. The air conditioning vents created some air flow issues. Well, they had turbulent flow experiences 😉 After the Glider Design Lab, the students were taken to a movie, dinner and lots of mini golf. Pictures say it all. On the last day, they had their glider glying competition where the flew their airplanes at the Eagle Gym and the airplane that flew the farthest won. The maximum was to scale the length of the gym. They also had their truss bridges tested by the tensile strength testers at the Materials Lab. The bridge that could withstand the maximum force made it to the top. The luncheon marked the end of this great camp where the campers where once again reunited with their families and took home back their broken bridge and few intact pieces of their balsa wood glider. As usual, pictures follow:

The 2^nd day started off with a class on Astrodynamics after the Breakfast. After that class, Space Lab class began and so did all the fun. The students were working on Simulink and STK. They could find orbits of different satellites, track the orbits and do all kind of fun stuff like putting an F-35 on the ISS Orbit.

However, they did 2 projects which involved created a spy satellite that could collect data from the Target City and transport it to the base. The 2^nd project involved creating a radar system that could detect a foreign enemy aircraft within a given time frame.

In Space Lab 2, Prof. Kim and Mr. Crabtree taught the class where the students worked on of the experimental space systems. They also contacted someone from New York using a HAM Radio. The satellite that relayed the signal was crossing Prescott on that day and thus the students were able to observe it clearly. All this was meant to give the students a clearer perspective on different uses of the satellites and their method of operation.

After the classes and dinner, all the campers went to play mini golf. The pictures that follow depicts how much fun they had.

On the 3^rd day, the students started their day with Prof. Helbling learning about Structures and Materials. After the Materials Lab and lunch at Chartwells, the students used the knowledge they gained in the class this morning to create a 3d model of a truss bridge using Solid Works. Randall Tolley assisted the professors and students to create the 3d models using the Rapid Prototyping Lab located at AxFab Building.

After dinner, the campers had a great session of Sand Volleyball and Dodgeball.

As usual, pictures follow: