How Engineering Technologies Help You and Me

By David G. Hack

Think about a bridge, a building, a highway, or an automobile. The work of an engineer seems obvious. Engineers are the people that help make those things happen. But what about other aspects of our day to day lives? How are engineers involved in helping us live the way we want to? What about something as common as the bowl of cereal that serves as breakfast in many of our households?

It is safe to say that from concept to consumption an engineer has touched this product in some way during every phase of its movement. “Engineers help determine how to minimize the handling of our product to give the highest possible quality,” said Larry Beckman, Engineering Manager at Quaker Oats in Cedar Rapids.

Engineers are part of the team that answers questions about how to do things. For example, after a decision is made to produce a cereal with a particular shape, color and texture, the engineers have input into what needs to happen to make large quantities of that cereal with a consistent high quality. It may be that new machines need to be manufactured to produce the particular shape. Perhaps machines need to be rearranged to make the movement of materials more efficient. Perhaps new mixers, ovens or packaging machines need to be developed or modified. Mechanical, electrical and even facilities engineers are involved in these decisions.

Process improvement engineers work with the research and development team on the specifics of cereal design. Once the specifics are figured out, project engineers work to scale up production to make as much as 200 cartons of cereal per minute. All during this process, of course, there are sensory engineers evaluating the quality of what is being produced to make sure the cereal is always at the same high standard.

“Our engineers like to see what they’ve accomplished. They go to the grocery and see the cereal they’ve helped produce and they take pride in that,” said Beckman. “Engineering is about applying the laws of physics to reach an end goal.”

People don’t go to college to study engineering thinking they might produce cereal, an automobile, or a bridge. Instead, “engineers tend to like hands-on work. They have a passion of curiosity. They like to dig into details, to figure out all the things that are going on,” Beckman added.

National Engineers Week, The Gazette, February 22, 2004

Services |  Resume |  Clips |  Contact |  Links |