Pictured: Students from each of the four international
institutions taking part look on as one of the remotely-controlled
hovercrafts is steered down the purpose-built circuit in Coventry
University's Jaguar Building, Gosford Street
Over the past three weeks, Coventry University has played host
to over 40 students and 12 staff from four European countries who
are all taking part in an engineering competition with a
difference.
The second Intensive Programme for Embedded Digital Signal
Processing (eDSP), which is funded by the European Union, has seen
students from Germany, Finland (where the event was held last year)
Lithuania and the UK working in mixed nationality teams of four to
design, build and evaluate a small remotely operated
Hovercraft.
On the final day, the teams competed against each other in
assessing their hovercrafts' ability to automatically follow a set
path which consisted of painted lines, curves, bends and straight
sections.
However, as well as the practical side to the project, the
students also attended a series of focused lectures given by
academics from the four countries and participated in a full
cultural and social programme.
John Evans, Principal Lecturer, European Union Development Group
from the Faculty of Engineering and Computing, said:
"This is the first time to my knowledge that Coventry University
has hosted such an event and it has been a huge success. The
students have really enjoyed working alongside their peers from
other partner universities and have found the whole experience very
rewarding.
"The added bonus is that they not only worked together on the
project, but socialised as well which is all part of the
educational experience."
Students from the victorious team each won a Coventry University
sweatshirt to take back home with them to their respective
countries and wear with pride!
Jamaki Prasad Koirala, a student from the Helsinki Metropolia
Univeristy of Applied Sciences in Finland, said:
"This is a new competition for me, and it's very exciting. Last
year the event was in Finland, but this year it's a pleasure to
visit Coventry to take part. Building these hovercrafts is a great
way to learn and apply the sort of engineering skills that are
needed in industry."
Next year, more than ten Coventry University students will
travel to take part in the same event in Lithuania and the
following year, ten Coventry University students will travel to
Germany to participate again.
For more information about Coventry University, please visit
their website here: www.coventry.ac.uk