I am Deanna Kovalcin, a current Mechanical Engineering student at the Cooper Union, and a member of the class of 2016. This webpage shows some of my recent projects.

During my first semester freshman year I worked with Zach Chang, Stephen Leone, Devora Najjar, Vishnu Narayanan, Kenneth O’Neill, and Kanjin Zou on a dance pad that works as a controller for any PC, allowing various games to be played in a more interactive manner. It had been built in various incarnations by the previous two years, and we were tasked with improving it.

The function that we focused on is the actual button-pressing, as opposed to a controller-specific game. The previous two years had had problems with their buttons consistently performing their functions, so we began again, forming our system around that. In order to maximize reliability, we went back to the simplest form of signal, having the buttons activate when a circuit, formed by two sheets of foil, is completed.

We cannot have buttons being pressed all the time, so there are eight buttons forming a square about a non-functioning center square, which provides a place to stand without pressing anything. The previous versions also had issues with transportation, so rather have one bulky pad, we split it up into three 3×1 pads that can be connected. The center section then has a USB cord to connect to a computer.

Individually, I worked on the layout of the circuitry involved, as well as the fabrication of the system as a whole.

This was a simple gear train assembled in order to acclimate to using the laser cutter.

Similarly, this was used to introduce us to very basic, logical design and execution.

Shortly I will have completed an indirect lightswitch, an exercise in complicating things as much as possible.

In the spring of Sophomore year, I am working with Hunter McKane, Jenny Jung, and Aman Grewal on an arcade box. This arcade box would contain a game of our creation described as follows:

There will be between two and four players. Each person stands on a different side of the box, and each side has different controls. Once the game begins, each control is labelled and each person is given an instruction that may or may not pertain to the controls on their side, and so the players must work together to keep the game going.

In the spring of freshman year, I was working with Jenny Jung, Andrew Liu, and Mike Ahn on a folding bike frame intended for urban commuters. This means there was more importance placed on the ease with which it can be folded and unfolded, the maneuverability of the folded contraption, and the storage on the bike than typical for that genre.

This is Dr. Duck McQuack. He doesn't have a degree.