After presenting our PDR to Arthrex in Naples, we returned to Gainesville ready to move forward with our project. We received wonderful feedback from the engineers and project managers who attended our PDR, and we compiled the feedback into workable action items.

With Prototype Inspection Day (PID) on the horizon, we have begun to conceptualize and construct our testing mechanisms utilizing IPPD’s lab space in the Nuclear Science Building. We plan to demonstrate these testing mechanisms for PID along with our working electrical components which arrived a few weeks ago!

Last Friday (10/20/23), we presented our Preliminary Design Review at the Arthrex headquarters in Naples, FL to our liaison, Alex, several other engineers, and a few product managers. We had a great discussion with the attendees and received wonderful feedback regarding our concepts. We were also finally able to get our hands on a physical drill, so we’re excited to implement the feedback from our presentation and start seeing our ideas in action!

For our visit, Arthrex was incredibly kind to organize an Experience Team to give us a tour of their campus before our presentation. We were able to see their new Studio X, the ArthroLab, manufacturing and testing labs, ArthroMan, and so many products on display throughout their headquarters. We are so grateful for everyone that stopped to greet us, and a special thanks to Morgan, Alex, and Elizabeth for personally leading us through the campus!

Getting back to Gainesville, we plan to start testing and validating our concepts in preparation for Prototype Inspection Day (PID) in November.

SurgiGauge is going places.

This week SurgiGauge finalized our product architecture and ordered parts to begin prototyping our initial design.

We also began drafting slides for the Preliminary Design Review (PDR) presentation and received valuable feedback from our coach, liaison, and a member of the Arthrex IPPD team from last year. Within the next week, we plan to perform a dry run with our slides, receive peer feedback, and finalize before presenting to various professionals at the Arthrex headquarters. Following the PDR presentation, we hope to integrate the conversations and ideas with more experienced engineers to enhance our design and prototype plan.

In our fourth week as team SurgiGauge, we attended a Team Building Workshop that included a Lean Six Sigma White Belt Certification course held by Florida Power & Light (FPL).

The course introduced us to the Lean Six Sigma methodology which aims to improve product quality and make processes more efficient. We can’t wait to implement what we’ve learned to our project! The course included a team building activity in which as a team, we made the process of buying a car at a dealership more efficient.

In this week, we also decided on a concept for our product and began drafting the Preliminary Design Report in preparation for our presentation at the Arthrex campus.

During the third week, SurgiGauge looked to the future.

We began initial concept generation for the drill attachment design in preparation for our upcoming Preliminary Design Review (PDR). After conducting background research and drawing out ideas, we gathered our concepts together and presented them to our coach, Dr. Schulze! We also completed a tentative Project Roadmap and assessed future risks using a Project Risk Table.

Additionally, we solidified plans with our liaison engineer, Alex Hild, to travel to Arthrex in Naples, FL to present our PDR on October 20th!

Through our second week, the team completed the remaining groundwork for our project. We created a logo for our team (see below)!

We had the opportunity to meet with our liaison engineer Alex Hild, who has been with Arthrex for over two years as an electrical engineer. During this meeting, our team clarified the scope of work for the project and understood the expectations of the final prototypes. Alex also begun the process of sending a AR400 drill to our team in Gainesville for testing purposes. Additionally, the team received a tour of the space available to IPPD students.

Our objectives for next week is to brainstorm and research possible mechanisms to gauge distance and angles. Each member is responsible for researching at least 3 possible designs, and these will be evaluated at next week’s meetings with the coach and liaisons.

Welcome to SurgiGauge’s blog page!

Though our first lecture had been delayed due to Hurricane Idalia, we were ready to hit the ground running this week after being assigned to work with Arthrex on a Drill Attachment System. Our plan is to provide weekly blogs updating our project status, and so far, we have been able to establish a team name, charter, positions, and weekly meeting time. Our objective for the next week is to clarify the scope of work and establish regular meetings with our coach, Dr. Kurt Schulze, and liaison engineer.

Below is a brief overview of our team:

• Brian Chen – Biosystem Engineering
• Rayan Dharia – Biomedical Engineering
• Daniel Giraldo – Electrical Engineering
• Kellen McKenney – Mechanical Engineering
• Andrea Noy – Mechanical Engineering
• Conrad Wyrick – Mechanical Engineering