originally spearheaded by

Mac Hogan and Paul Ford,

continues to progress and is

now managed by the ME

Staff, who continue to write

and post news that highlights

the students, faculty and

alums alike. If you are not

following on Facebook or

Twitter, you’re missing some

great information!

The Arkansas Academy of

Mechanical Engineering is

evolving, growing, and

spreading its influence in a

number of new areas. Our

increased visibility and

exposure to the ME students

and faculty, as well as the

college, is indicative of our

successes and the future

looks even brighter!

- Bob Harrison

Fellow AAME Members,

It is my pleasure to report

that the status of the

Arkansas Academy of

Mechanical Engineering is

good; we are evolving and

our impact and influence

are growing. These truly

are exciting times for us!

The January board meeting

was held at the Caterpillar

manufacturing facility,

located in North Little

Rock. (You can read all

about the meeting on page

3! ) Since the meeting, we

have received considerable

feedback from attendees

about the potential

benefits these types of

meetings with industry

could have on the

department and the

college. With input from

the department, this may

be another avenue for the

Academy to support and

assist our alma mater in

developing relationships

with our contacts in

industry. We have

received a number of

suggestions and

recommendations for

future companies, and I

hope to discuss this during

our annual meeting on

Saturday, April 5.

President’s Corner

The Student Liaison group

held their first major event

on February 25. They met

with students, conducted

resume reviews, mock

interviews, and other

similar activities to help

our students better

prepare themselves to

launch their careers. The

event was a great success

& AAME volunteers stayed

busy pretty much all day

with back-to-back

meetings!

During a recent visit to the

department, I was able to

observe the Virtual

Machine Shop and 3-D

printers in action. I was

mesmerized by this

technology and thrilled to

see how enthusiastic the

students are with the new

capabilities. Also, the

collaborative space created

by the newly-designed

atrium is a huge

improvement! I hope all of

you will attend the 50th

Building Anniversary Open

House on Friday, April 4

to see these innovative

areas and the impacts of

the $2.7 million renovation

that occurred over the

past year.

The Social Media

Development project,

F R O M T H E

E D I T O R :

We would appreciate

your input and

contribution to this

publication to make it

more interesting for

all, so please submit

articles/topics for

inclusion. Authors of

articles will be given

proper accolades.

We also would love

to publicize what our

members are doing

for the profession.

Please e-mail these to

rrasnic@ryan-

engineering.com.

The newsletter is

published quarterly.

- Russ Rasnic

A R K A N S A S A C A D E M Y

O F M E C H A N I C A L

E N G I N E E R I N G

A University of Arkansas Alumni Association

AAME Headlines Promoting & Supporting the Mechanical Engineer

M A R C H 2 0 1 4

S P E C I A L

P O I N T S O F

I N T E R E S T :

President’s

Update

Board Member

Spotlight—

Keith Bradshaw

Annual

Banquet &

Meeting

Stories from

Caterpillar

ME Building

Celebrates

50th

Anniversary

P A G E 2

Board Member Spotlight ME sat down with Keith Bradshaw (2008

AAME Inductee) and asked him to tell us

about his life, career and experiences. Here’s

what we found!

Tell us about your current employment. I'm the

VP of Engineering for Travis Lumber in Mansfield,

AR. It's a large family owned sawmill and I've

known and worked with the President / Owner,

Gilbert Travis, for 27 years. I was Chief Engineer

for the OEM, HEMCO, which built most of the mill

in 1990 and then partner in another OEM, ASM,

which continued adding to the mill into the 90's

and early 2000's. I tell engineers to be very careful

what they design ...... because they might be

responsible to keep it running one day!

Tell us about your background. I grew up on a

farm in Mountain Home, AR and received my BSME

from the U of A in 1987. The defense industry was

very strong at the time and I had several job offers

but HEMCO seemed like a good fit considering my

experiences of working on equipment on the farm.

The late 80's and early 90's was a time of rapid

expansion in the sawmill industry and it allowed me

to gain experience very fast. HEMCO was

purchased in late 1992 and the GM and I quit and

started a company called Advanced Sawmill

Machinery and located it in the panhandle of

Florida. I never really wanted to leave AR and came

back to the state in 2001 to be the VP Operations

and Chief Engineer for Hi-Tech Engineering in Hot

Springs co-owned by AAME member Russell

Kennedy. Russell had been the Chief Engineer of

HEMCO and had hired me out of college and left in

1988 to start Hi-Tech; so it was a double

homecoming for me. Hi-Tech sold to a Canadian

firm a few years later and I found myself in another

more corporate situation. After a lot of turmoil for

a year, I began doing consulting work for sawmills.

Travis Lumber had a fire in early 2010 and Gilbert

called me to come run the rebuild project. I told

Gilbert no several times but he can be pretty

persuasive. I continued running projects for Gilbert

after the fire project was finished and three years

later finally decided to become an employee.

What did you tell your parents you were going

to be when you grew up? I was going to be a

quarterback in the NFL up until mid JH, and then I

really don't remember what I thought I'd be. I

wasn't going to be an engineer though, because I

didn't even know what one was.

How did you meet your spouse? I used to go to a

monthly event called "Pig and Whistle" at Dad's

Place in Hot Springs & one month Dad's Place was

being remodeled and they weren't going to have

the event. I decided we'd have our own version at

my house and she came with a buddy that I water

skied with. I gained an incredible wife out of the

deal...but I sure missed my ski buddy after that.

What do you do in your spare time? Well, I

really don't have much since I work 110 miles

through the mountains from where I live, but

photography and trout fishing are my 2 hobbies. I

maintain a sports photo website for Lakeside High

School where my daughter attends and son

graduated from. The one thing I do purely for

myself is spend about 5 days with a buddy on the

White River chasing Brown Trout when the trophy

area below Bull Shoals Dam opens Feb 1. We fish

about 14 hours a day and there's no place I'd rather

be.

What’s been your biggest challenge as an

engineer? Working with people with extreme

differing levels of technical ability, education, and

frankly social skills. It's very common to be in a

sales meeting including every slice of people from a

few pretty rough millwrights to highly educated,

v e r y

p r o p e r ,

corporate

types. It's a

challenge to

g a i n

everyone's

t r u s t ,

especially in

the same

meeting.

Kei

th B

radsh

aw

, B

SM

E 1

98

7

had good conversations with Mr. Rivera,

discussing potential cooperative efforts with interns, placement of engineers, and

CDIO-type projects.

Mr. Rivera will be our speaker at the annual banquet on April 4th, which will

allow all members to learn about the “Pride of Arkansas Manufacturing”. See

you there!

our meeting. We took a tour of

the facility, observed the steps that go into the manufacturing of their

world class motor graders, and then enjoyed BBQ with Paul Rivera, the

General Manager, and a number of key technical and management staff.

All of those who attended were impressed by the facility and the warmth and openness of the

people. Dr. Leylek and Dr. English

P A G E 3 P R O M O T I N G & S U P P O R T I N G T H E M E C H A N I C A L E N G I N E E R

The January board meeting was

held at the Caterpillar manufacturing facility, located in

North Little Rock. The meeting was attended by several board

members, plus Dr. Jim Leylek, ME department head and College

representatives, Dean John English, and Kellie Knight, Senior Director of Development and External

Relations.

The Caterpillar folks were gracious

and welcoming and even allowed us use of their mini-auditorium for

As you probably know, the Annual

Induction and Awards Banquet is

on Friday, April 4, 2014 at the

Fayettevi l le Town Center.

Reception begins at 6:00 PM and

the dinner program will kick off at

7:00 PM.

The business meeting begins at

8:30 AM on Saturday, April 5th at

the Chancellor Hotel and

breakfast will be provided.

Annual Banquet

If you have questions

regarding registration or

lodging, please contact Morgan

Smith in the ME office at

479.575.4899 or email at

mrs021@uark.edu.

Please join us to welcome 4

new members to the

A c a d e m y , m e e t a n d

congratulate our scholarship

recipients and kick off the

start of another great year!

AAME Meets Caterpillar

2013 Scholarship Recipients

P A G E 4

In 1964, the Beatles invaded the

US, the Civil Rights Act was

passed into law, Ali was heavy

weight champion of the world

and the U of A opened the

newly-built ME building to its

first class of excited engineering

students!

On Friday, April 4, the

M e ch a n i c a l E n g i n e e r i n g

Department will host an open

house in celebration of the

50th year anniversary of our

beloved, ME Building.

The event will be held from 1

PM to 3 PM and will highlight

the building’s history, its recent

$2.7 million renovation and the

opening of the innovation

Virtual Machine Shop and

upgrading student collaboration

spaces.

Many rumors abound as to how

ME came to be the only

department in engineering to be

housed in our

own building,

but the simple

truth is...we

were just too

loud!

According to

Dr. Thomas

Jefferson, ME

Department Head during

that time, a lab housing an

extremely noisy, one-

cylinder diesel engine was

located directly beneath the

dean's office in Engineering

Hall which, prompted the

move across Dickson Street.

The dean decided that

nobody should have to be

“above” ME!

However the decision was

made, the building has been

home to many generations

of loyal & dedicated

Mechanical Engineering

Golden Anniversary Celebration

students who have made sure

the building has certainly been

used to its full potential. The

r e c e n t g r o w t h i n

u n d e r g r ad u a t e s t u d e n t

enrollment has the building

busting at the seams and every

square inch is being utilized in

every way imaginable!

While we adore our beloved

building, the department does

look forward to the time when

we can relocate into a space

that will better accommodate

our students

needs and spaces

for creat i ve

projects. Until

that time, we’ll

celebrate! Hope

everyone will join

us on April 4!

A A M E H E A D L I N E S

ME

Bu

ild

ing

Cel

ebra

tes

50

Yea

rs

P A G E 5 P R O M O T I N G & S U P P O R T I N G T H E M E C H A N I C A L E N G I N E E R

Breaking More Records On Friday, February 28, the ME

Department set another record for

number of freshmen declaring ME as

their major on Decision Day 2014.

Out of 659 freshman, a whopping 180

(27%) crossed the stage and proudly

made Mechanical Engineering their

new home for the next few years!

“ME is by far the biggest and most

popular of the 8 CoE programs,”

commented Jim Leylek, ME Dept Head.

“I truly believe our continuing success

will lead to much bigger and better

resources for ME!”

One of the 180 students declaring ME

is keeping alive a family tradition.

Jacob Bradshaw , AAME’s Keith

Bradshaw’s son, is now officially part of

the ME family. And we couldn’t be

happier to welcome another Bradshaw

to the fold!

50 Years of Mechanical Engineering Building History

Left: ASME 1964

Center: ME Lab, 1973

Below left: ME Building, 2003

Below: Right F.K. Deaver with Students, 1974

Left: Jacob Bradshaw, ME Class of 2019 &

Future AAME Inductee!

Above:

Excited ME Students at Decision Day!

P A G E 6

2014 North American Region Meeting

A A M E H E A D L I N E S

CD

IO C

om

es t

o F

ayet

tev

ille

On March 10 & 11, the ME

Department hosted the CDIO

2014 North American Region

Meeting in Fayetteville. The 2-

day meeting consisted of one

day of speakers from the

Un ivers i t y o f Arkansas

presenting how leadership and

ethics should be integrated into

the engineering discipline, ME

faculty describing how they’ve

implemented CDIO into their

c l a s s e s , a n d A A M E

representatives discussing their

academic and real world

experiences, and how they

relate to CDIO. The second

day CDIO board members

presented a full workshop to

the ME faculty to discuss

designing integrated curriculum

and learning assessments for

students.

During the meeting, ME’s David

Albers and David Jensen gave an

incredible presentation to

illustrate how they have

integrated hands-on design

projects into Mechanics of

Materials and Machine Element

Design classes. Within this class,

t he

students work in teams,

design a product, analyze

the design, then finally

build and test the

s t ructu re s . Both

expressed that the

students’ reactions have

been extremely positive

and that students are

engaged, they talk about

the projects outside of class,

and t ha t they are

competitive to “win” the

best design.

In Mechanics of Materials,

students must design, build

and test a bridge using PVC

pipe and in Machine Element

Design the students are

tasked with creating a

teaching aid that could be

used in the existing ME

curriculum. Many of the

teaching aids were produced

using the new 3D printers

and desktop mi l l ing

machines in the recently

opened Virtual Machine

Shop. Student response to

hav ing

t h e s e

tools and being able to

experience actual design has

been overwhelming! “We

actually get to build something!”

is a phrase that is often heard

in the hallways of ME lately!

The 2-day meeting provided an

oppor tun i t y fo r some

wonderful discussion and

innovative ideas for the future

of ME curriculum. Attendees

included ME faculty, AAME

m e m b e r s , C o l l e g e o f

Engineering representatives,

Dassault Falcon Jet and CDIO

members from Canada, North

Carolina, and New Hampshire.

P A G E 7

Mike Hays & Frank Porbeck

presented AAME’s financial

report at January’s meeting.

This is the preliminary 2013

year-end report and the

final report will be

presented at the April 2014

meeting.

If you have any questions

regarding contributions,

please contact Mike Hays at

479.521.9749.

Engineers Abroad Most students spend their winter break relaxing,

visiting with family and friends; this winter break, a group of engineering students left their homes and

flew more than 1,300 miles away from Fayetteville.

Arkansas Engineers Abroad (AEA) is a student-led

organization at the University of Arkansas. Over winter break, eight AEA students, went to the village

of More Tomorrow in Belize to work on a project to improve the water quality in the village. Among

those students was ME Senior, Jake Pitts serving as

the Project Ambassador.

The project is in its final stages and Jake has been involved during his entire academic career.

“Without this experience, I would not have developed as an engineer to the degree that I have,” stated Pitts, “Nor would I

have developed as a person to the degree that I have.”

Financial Report

P R O M O T I N G & S U P P O R T I N G T H E M E C H A N I C A L E N G I N E E R

204 Mechanical Engineering Building

College of Engineering

University of Arkansas

Fayetteville, AR 72701-1201

Phone: 479.575.4153

Fax: 479.575.6982

E-mail: melhart@uark.edu

Mission of the Arkansas Academy of

Mechanical Engineering

To promote and support the mechanical

engineering profession, to honor the Mechanical

Engineer and to work with the University of

Arkansas Department of Mechanical Engineering

to increase the appeal of Mechanical Engineering

and further the educational development of

future engineers.

2013-2014 Board & Committee Chairs: Bob Harrison, President Russ Rasnic, President-Elect/Publicity Zane Boatright, Past President Cristine Wolf, Secretary

Mike Hays, Treasurer Lamar Pettus, Honorary Advisor Keith Bradshaw Paul Ford Mac Hogan Jack Murders

Richard Royal Larry Young Bob Norwood, Membership Frank Porbeck, Finance Bill Green, Conduct/Bylaws Chris Weiser, Fundraising

Rick Couvillion, Awards

Arkansas Academy

of Mechanical Engineering

Social Media Thanks to the efforts of Mac Hogan & Paul Ford, we are thrilled to announce our

new presence in the social media world!

The Department of Mechanical Engineering has launched a blog, Facebook page, and Twitter stream, and we would

love for you to participate in the conversation! And because we truly want it to be an ongoing conversation, we

encourage you to share your news. How have you used your mechanical engineering degree?

Please keep us updated on your accomplishments, including career developments, research projects, and honors

received. In addition to these social media outlets, we are stepping up our media relations efforts – reaching out to

academic journals and general news publications alike so that those outside the Department may gain a better

understanding of all the exciting ways Mechanical Engineers contribute to our world.

You may follow along and keep up with the latest news here:

meeg.uark.edu/

facebook.com/uarkmechengineering

twitter.com/uarkmecheng

Please take a few moments to “like” our Facebook page, follow our Twitter feed, and comment on our blog. To

submit your news, please email Melynda at melhart@uark.edu.

www.meeg.uark.edu/aame

Promoting & Supporting the Mechanical Engineer