Facilities and Equipment
The Manufacturing and Industrial Engineering Department at UTRGV boasts state-of-the-art equipment, laboratories, and facilities that can accommodate research and education programs at both undergraduate and graduate levels. The labs include the Metrology Laboratory, the Manufacturing Processes Laboratory, the Computer Integrated Manufacturing Laboratory, the Materials Engineering Laboratories, the Additive Manufacturing Laboratory, the Biomedical manufacturing Laboratory, and the Virtual Reality Lab.
Major Equipment for Education and Research
| 1. Precision Machining: High precision mill, lathe, grinding machine, and vertical machining center |
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2. Renishaw AM 250 Selective Laser Melting 3D Metal Printing Machine:
This is a SLM based metal 3D printer which use a high power-density laser to melt and fuse metallic powders together. Metals that can be printed include: Inconel, Al, SSL, Titanium Alloys. Key component of the machine include:
- Laser:
- 200 W CW Infrared Ytterbium Fiber Laser
- Central emission wavelength 1070 +/- 10nm
- X, Y, Scanning Speed Up to 2000mm/s
- Beam quality: TEM00 (M2) < 1.1
- Beam spot size: 70 μm adjustable
- Controlled and customizable laser scan pattern
- Build Chamber:
- Build size: 245x245x300mm (Z axis)
- Argon sub 100ppm O2 high purity atmosphere
- Inert atmosphere conditioning system with dual oxygen monitoring system
- Autofab R&D Software
- Sieving station for powder refinement and recycling
- Immersion separation vacuum for reactive material disposal.
3. Laser material processing center
An Ultra short laser system with Nano scale movement control for laser polishing, precision machining, micro machining, laser ablation, and bio printing.
4. Rapid prototyping: Z-Corp 3-D printer
Z printer uses an inkjet printing mechanism to selectively deposit a liquid binding materials in the shape of the section to print parts layer by layer into a 3D model. It can also can print parts in full color.
5. Rapid prototyping: Makerbot 3-D printer
6. 3D Systems stereolithography 3D printing machine
3DS ProJet 7000 HD 3D printer which builds on the advantages of Stereolithography (SLA) allowing for single large-sized or series of smaller-sized additive manufactured prototypes and end-use parts up to 15 x 15 x 10 in (380 x 380 x 250 mm) in size. Print with fine feature detail in a wide choice of engineered materials that match or exceed traditional plastic properties.
7. Lambda Microcure 2100 Variable Frequency Microwave Oven
- The Lambda Technologies MicroCure 2100 is designed around the unique Variable Frequency Micro wave process technique for the selective, rapid, and uniform processing of materials.
- VFM processing has several specific advantages over other technologies:
- Rapid and selective heating when compared to conventional ovens
- Uniform energy distribution
- Precise Process cycle control
Rapid sweep over controlled bandwidth allows processing of electronics packaging assemblies without arcing and circuit damage
8. Granulec Material Shredder
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Retsch PM200 Planetary Ball Mill
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Retsch ZM 200 Centrifugal Mill
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9. HAS Simulation System
10. Stereoscopic CAVE System
Scientific Instruments
- Corrosion testing: Anton Paar, Compact Calotest (CATc) with stand-alone video microscope
- Corrosion testing: Gamry Instruments, Gamry Reference 3000 Potentiostat/Galvanostat/ZRA w/Auxiliary
- Corrosion testing: Hastest Solutions, Salt Spray Chamber
- Dynamometer: Kistler Instrument Corp 3D milling dynamometer, 3-D turning dynamometer
- Ergonomics: force measurement machine
- Ergonomics: hand-eye coordination machine
- Ergonomics: stress test machine
- Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscope
- Magnetic stirrer: Fischer Scientific
- Materials measurement: Brinell hardness tester
- Materials measurement: Instron tensile tester for low strength materials
- Materials measurement: Tinius Olsen tensile tester
- Measurement: Browne and Sharpe coordinate measuring machine
- Measurement: FARO coordinate measuring machine
- Mechanical testing and materials performance: Shimadzu Scientific Instruments, Microhardness, HMV-G21DT
- Stereoscopic Single Screen System with 73-inch diagonal
- Surface finish: Keyence Corp Precision Optical Microscope
- Surface finish: Keyence Corp Precision Optical Microscope
- Thin films and coatings characterization: Agilent Technologies, Agilent carry 60 uv-vis spectrophotometer, G6860AA-Cary 60 Instrument Bundle
- Thin films and coatings characterization: Bio-Logic USA, Scanning Vibrating Probe (SVP) System, Model M370 Scanning Electrochemical Workstation
- Thin films and coatings characterization: Brookhaven Instruments Corp, NanoBrook 90Plus PALS Instrument
- Thin films and coatings characterization: North Central Instruments, Leica DM750M Optical Microscope
- Thin films and coatings characterization: Perkin Elmer, FRONTIER MIR PerkinElmer ATR-IR
- Thin films and coatings characterization: Rame-Hart Instrument Co, Raméhart Model 500/advanced goniometer/tensiometer with DROPimage Advanced v 2.8
Computer Systems and Software
- Dell 58 NODE High Performance Cluster
- High-speed Camera: Phantom ® VEO 401L monochrome high speed camera
- Materialise Magic 3D printing software suite