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Where Theory Meets Practice

A look inside ENG’s new design and manufacturing facility

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The Engineering Product Innovation Center (EPIC) has been open for less than a year, and it’s already become the tinkerer’s paradise. On any given day, the machine shop hums and clinks with life as students, faculty, and staff from across campus transform ideas into actual things. Engineers rub shoulders with sculptors, sculptors with biologists, and biologists with rocket scientists as they share the shop’s machines with the help of experienced EPIC staff members and student workers.

“We believe that engineering education in this country is in need of an upgrade, and we want to be leaders of it,” says EPIC director Gerry Fine, a College of Engineering professor of the practice.

The 15,000-square-foot facility at 750 Commonwealth Ave. houses computer-aided design (CAD) software and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) technology, 3-D printers, laser processers, a robotic assembly line, and a variety of machining tools—including lathes, millers, and good old-fashioned drills and saws. John Tegan (ENG’88) recently donated funds to name the large design room the Lorraine A. Tegan Design Studio. A separate materials characterization lab, metals foundry, circuitry studio, and carpentry shop complete the first floor space. General classrooms fill the second floor.

EPIC was made possible through a partnership with principle industry sponsors GE Aviation, Procter & Gamble, PTC, Rolls Royce, and Schlumberger. Laboratory supervisor Joseph Estano keeps the facility open seven days a week and has a staff of four full-time employees and 16 student workers scheduled throughout the day to help visitors.