The UPRM Model Factory integrates modern equipment, materials, and people into a manufacturing system.  Its mode of operation is through interdisciplinary working teams from several engineering and business disciplines.  This is a coordinated effort between Industrial, Electrical & Computer, and Mechanical Engineering.  The goals of these laboratory facilities are to provide the following:

 

• Basic training to students through course labs and project initiatives
• Practice based experiences dealing with all aspects of an actual manufacturing system.
• A space where local manufacturing industry issues can be studied.
• A place where modern production technology and techniques can be studied as they are applied in an integrated manufacturing system.
• The opportunity to assist local manufacturers in the development of their production system.
• Incubator facilities where products and process can be developed or improved.
• Serve as a meeting place where people from several disciplines can meet and learn to work in teams, and get an appreciation for the technical aspects of the other’s area of knowledge.

 

Currently, this laboratory houses a for-profit manufacturing activity and provides students with an exemplary manufacturing experience inside the university.  The factory hosts a surface mount technology (SMT) printed circuit assembly (PCA) line and a three-axes CNC milling machine in which production and prototype runs are performed.

 

As for-profit initiatives are defined, students receive pay for their involvement, similar to a COOP experience.  These students are then ideal candidates for course projects and summer and COOP internship in related endeavors.  Such young but experienced graduates are then positioned to initiate new business ventures or play lead roles in interested recruiters. Various companies (notably Hewlett Packard, Fuji America and FeatureCam) have contributed to this initiative, which has been active for over ten years.

This laboratory has been designed to provide students with hands on experience in the analysis and evaluation of humans and their working environment.  Tasks are simulated and evaluated based on anthropometrics, cardiovascular, and force requirements. The laboratory is equipped with modern equipment for the analysis of work systems and computers with software for the analysis of manual material handling activities. The following is a list of some of the equipment available in the laboratory.

• Computers with licenses of ErgoIntelligence for analysis and evaluation of workstation design as well as the analysis of lifting tasks with the NIOSH lifting guide,
• Chatillon digital force measurement gauges and equipment for the analysis of pushing and pulling tasks,
• Hand dynamometers and pinch gauges to measure hand force,
• Anthropometers and calipers for the collection of anthropometric data,
• Heart rate meters and a treadmill for the evaluation of cardiovascular requirements of physical tasks,
• Electromyography with data collection software for the analysis of muscular activity,
• Goniometers and data collection software for the analysis of flexion, extension, and rotation of body members,
• Heat stress monitors and Wet-bulb globe temperature meter for the analysis of environmental variables,
• Dosimeters and sound level meters for the evaluation of noise levels,
• Photometers for studies of illumination,
• Stop watches and digital recording equipment for Time Study and Work Measurement analysis, among many others.

This teaching-learning facility is the hands-on laboratory for the Real Time Process Control course.  Students design, build, and control scaled models, mainly emulating real manufacturing operations.  The emphasis is in the use of programmable logic controllers (PLC), industrial sensors and actuators, pneumatics, and computer-based human machine interfaces.

The lab counts with 20 workstations equipped with all the necessary software and hardware.  The facility is available for demonstration and custom trainings.

The lab is equipped with Statistical software for data analysis, design of experiments, and validation procedures. It can also provide hands-on demonstrations for applied statistics courses and for simulation courses.

The Department of Industrial Engineering has a modern computing and information technology infrastructure. Servers running on Windows Server 2012 platforms support the computing infrastructure. The servers support all software packages and general applications used by the students in the IE courses.

The computing center located in II-108 and is equipped with 36 stations connected to the department’s local area network and to the Internet. It serves as a general-purpose computing facility and training center. It provides printing and plotting capabilities. The computer center has extended operation hours during weekdays and Sundays. An additional virtual computing laboratory is available as a remote desktop to students and faculty for use with simulations, analytics, modeling, and computing demanding software.

A video conferencing room is available in II-114. This multifunctional facility is equipped with 30 computer stations and is used as a regular classroom for technical courses, computer center, and for distance learning.