Final. Design. Review. The three words at the back of our minds for the past 9 months. The culmination of two semesters of meticulous designing, prototyping, and development. The DesiGators knew the stakes were high and were ready to put… Read More

Fruits, cheese, jerky – you name it, we’re drying it! Now that the team has completely finished the dehydrator the time has come to put it through its paces and begin drying snacks in preparation for the FDR. The fully… Read More

The DesiGators made Dr. MacIntosh’s lab their new home for the week as they geared up to get ready for the FDR. The team picked up the remaining three drying chambers from Brad at Tampa Bay Acrylics last week along… Read More

The DesiGators geared up for Prototype Inspection Day (PID) by getting one chamber fully operational with some dried mango and celery samples. The team rolled the entire table with the chamber and monitor attached over to Florida Gym from the… Read More

The team took a tremendous step forward this week and got ready for our first fully integrated drying trial, mere days before Prototype Inspection Day. The team worked diligently throughout the week to integrate the air handling subassembly, the load-cell… Read More

There she is in all her glory! The team worked hard this week on finalizing the manufacturing needed to get one drying chamber fully operational. The team is planning on conducting a test run of Dr. MacIntosh’s drying lab next… Read More

The title might be a little clickbait but worry not, the DesiGators did indeed meet with Tutco-Farnam over Spring Break. Alex happened to be in North Carolina for Spring Break and realized that he was a mere thirty minutes away… Read More

Fantastic news for one of our team members – Virginia Covert! Virginia got accepted into the Master’s Program here at the University of Florida! The team is so proud of Virginia and would like to invite all of our readers… Read More

The DesiGators weeks of hard work have finally paid off! The team now has all of the necessary components needed to begin another (almost) fully integrated drying run. Apple slices were used in this iteration of the testing phase and… Read More

The DesiGators received great news this week in the form of the air heater being delivered! The critical component was the last part needed to complete the air handling subassembly; its delivery will allow the team to begin test runs… Read More

The FSHN lab was a buzz of drilling, coding, filing, cutting, and assembling this week as the DesiGators continued working hard on both the manufacturing and software fronts. The team assembled the air handling subsystem in its entirety, with the… Read More

The DesiGators turned their attention this week towards answering the age-old question – “How many engineers does it take to drill four holes through a 16-gauge stainless-steel tabletop?” Turns out the answer is all four DesiGators! We each took a… Read More

This week was yet another week of great progress for the DesiGators! The team has been working hard to bring all the aspects of the dehydrator to fruition. One major milestone that the team was able to achieve was the… Read More

The DesiGators took this week to buckle on our engineering helmets and get our hands dirty! As the project swings heavily into the manufacturing stage, it is all hands on board as the team strives to build a fully functional… Read More

The DesiGators made two massive leaps forward in their project – with the first milestone being the integration of plots into the GUI. The new GUI can now take a data set and produce a plot onto a psychrometric chart.… Read More

The DesiGators successfully 3D-printed the first version of their….wiffleball? Although similar in appearance, the structure shown below is actually a sensor cap designed for the drying chambers – the part will give the sensor a place to sit inside the… Read More

The DesiGators showed their dedication to their project by braving a tornado on the first day of class! The team had the opportunity to listen to guest speaker Professor Bill McElroy and learned about engineering character and competence. The team… Read More