Every year, the South African Institute of Electrical Engineers (SAIEE) runs a competition open to engineering undergraduates. Entries are based on final year projects that focus on innovative engineering and social benefits. The entrants are judged according to international standards on a range of technical and academic criteria.
The 2006 SAIEE National Student Competition was held at the University of Cape Town on 23 November.
Viv Crone, president of the SAIEE, explains that there are three main areas which the competition addresses: innovation and social impact; technical and academic quality; and presentation and communication.
"Communication practically takes precedence," he says. "It is essential for engineers to be able to motivate projects to people who will fund them - who may not be engineers themselves.
"The SAIEE has been involved in transformation and skills upgrading for many years and we have focused on supporting the development of engineering skills among a broad and representative sector of the country's population. The competition serves to stimulate and recognise practical engineering projects of high quality, which demonstrate key elements of innovation and the provision of solutions that have a beneficial impact on communities.
"The standards applied in the judging emphasise solid technical execution, high quality academic documentation and presentation and the communication skills that are critical in engineering. The SAIEE drew up these criteria, taking into account local needs and using international standards as a reference."
The winners included five projects from the two sections that the competition covers - universities and universities of technology.
In the university section, from five entries, first prize went to Jonathan Angel and Kirin Padayachee of Wits for a project that used a virtual glove and neural network to compose music from hand gestures, which could also be developed to interpret sign language into speech or text. Second prize went to Martin Snyman of Northwest University for an electronic paint palette that can analyse a paint sample into its component primary colours. A discretionary special merit prize was awarded to Deon Blaauw of Stellenbosch for a paper on how to design robots using interchangeable modules.
First prize in the universities of technology section went to Andre Gouws of the Vaal University of Technology for a training simulator that allows remote simulation of equipment, making it unnecessary to have physical plant at many locations. Second prize went to Edgar Osborne of the Cape Peninsula University of Technology for a simulation and upgraded design of the substation reticulation network of the Bellville campus.
"All the presentations were of exceptionally high standard. They were well presented and explained and all shared a core focus on using innovative engineering to address real-world challenges. We are very pleased that the competition is producing such high quality entries," concludes Crone.
For more information see the SAIEE website: www.saiee.org.za
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