Hi everyone, this is Arthi – a new MECH ambassador blogger! After one month into the Fall term, I have had enough time to transition from the co-op mindset to focusing on school again. I am also looking back on the last eight months I spent working at Cadex Electronics, located in Richmond, BC.
Co-workers at Cadex Electronics
Electronics as a Thermofluids major? Yes, I was skeptical about it too when I took the job, but I wanted to expand my skillset. I was hired into the friendly mechanical engineering team at Cadex to help with one primary project – managing heat dissipation inside industrial battery chargers – very relevant to my focus. I won’t get into the details of the project here, but here are the outcomes:
- I developed a more intuitive understanding of conductive and convective heat transfer
- I became more competent in prototyping with electronic hardware and collecting data
- I learned how to design experiments and interpret test data to implement practical design solutions.
These are transferrable technical experiences that will help me with my Capstone project (future blog) this year, and even help me to find a job after graduation. So the moral of the story is to be open to co-op opportunities that you think you may not have all the skills for. You will be surprised to see how quickly you can learn with determination.
I also have a tip for anyone who is going to do co-op, or currently in co-op. Remember the learning objectives you are supposed to write and submit to the Co-op Office at the beginning of every work term? In addition to writing appropriate learning objectives based on your job description, use those as an opportunity to create some goals for technical skills you want to learn. I really wanted to gain experience using electronic sensors and integrating them into a setup for mechanical experiments. I made this as one of my learning objectives and talked to my supervisor to find an appropriate project. As a result of that, I got to select and wire accelerometers for conducting drop testing of electronic products. This was also very useful to the company because it provided the mechanical design team with deceleration values experienced by their products. They can now use this data to improve the strength of their industrial battery chargers and analyzers.
Overall, it was satisfying to end my last co-op work term at Cadex Electronics. Let me know in the comments below if you have any questions about co-op. I feel refreshed and ready to tackle seven courses this term! I hope you will stay tuned for the next post.
Arthi