The trip was organized through Clemson University and CU-ICAR. Dr Tanju Karanfil provided support for the faculty to travel to BMW FIZ (Research and Development) in Munich. Four faculty members, Georges Fadel, Joshua Summers, Ardalan Vahidi, and Gregory Mocko, from Mechanical Engineering attended the BMW-CU Showcase event. The showcase event was two full days, April 7-8, 2014 in which they interacted with several BMW employees including the E-Kreis (Engineering Planning Circle), T-Kreis (manufacturing planning circle), and project partners. The goal of the showcase event was to (1) unveil the Deep Orange 4 Vehicle from AuE students, (2) highlight several completed and current projects and the value to BMW research and development, (3) identify the core expertise from Clemson University in assembly production systems, and (4) identify future research project idea. The projects presented to BMW from ME faculty included: (1) lightweight design and assembly methods to reduce parts during assembly processes, (2) analysis and development of software and knowledge representations for assembly systems, (3) a highlight of ME capstone design projects, (4) analysis and redesign of hatch closure systems to alleviate noise concerns, (5) usage of big data for connected vehicle platforms, and (6) visual inspection support during assembly processes.
In addition to the showcase event, meetings were organized with project partners to discuss progress and next steps for new research projects. Finally, an alumni and friends event was organized in which the past BMW-Clemson liaisons attended – Norbert Seyr, Andreas Obieglo, Kilian Funk, and Joerg Schulte.
The CU-ICAR partnership office, Suzanne Dickerson and Amy Bulger, were the primary contact responsible for organizing the event. In addition to ME faculty, other departments from Clemson University were well represented including AuE, SoC, and EE.
