Contact: Leigh Flynn (flynnl@alpha.nsula.edu)
News Bureau
Northwestern State University
Natchitoches, LA 71497
(318) 357-6466

7/27/2000

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NATCHITOCHES - Students in Northwestern State University's Department of Industrial and Engineering Technology will soon be able to work on state-of-the-art manufacturing systems without leaving the university.

Two flexible manufacturing systems will be purchased with $127,188 from the Board of Regents Support Fund. Dr. Thomas Hall Jr., coordinator for the department, said the systems should be online and fully integrated into the classroom setting by spring 2001.

Hall said industrial and engineering technology students taking Instrumentation and Control and engineering technology students taking Automation and Control will benefit from the systems.

Industrial technology students study drafting, manufacturing materials and processes, production, inventory control, metals technology and machining and industrial control systems, Hall said. All those components are brought together in the flexible manufacturing systems trainer.

The systems are comprised of a conveyor system with stamping and drilling stations, a pick-and-place robotic arm and a CNC mill. A programmable logic controller and a series of sensors and pneumatic valves and cylinders control an entire system. The flexible manufacturing system is a small version of manufacturing systems that industrial technology graduates will encounter immediately upon employment in most industries.

The engineering technology students will benefit from the use of the CNC mill, which is programmed using a front-panel keypad or Computer-Aided Manufacturing software on a personal computer.

"These systems will provide the students with real world experience that is not currently available to them," Hall said. "It gives the students an opportunity to see first-hand how the different subjects that they study fit together into a complete manufacturing process."

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