Overview:
Hephaestus covers all the material in an introductory mechanical engineering course at MIT. The content also cuts across first year collegiate physics and high school physics and materials science courses as well. The FIRST competition is another framework for understanding how this content might be taught in high schools. In fact, the initial robot kits are taken straight from the the 2.007 Introductory Mechanical Engineering course website.

• Key Physics concepts embedded in robot design include:
• Rate of acceleration
• Top Speedss
• Energy consumption at critical intervals of speed
• Mass
• Gear Ratios / Torque
• Friction
• Buoyancy
• Center of gravity
  

Key Content in MIT Mechanical Engineering Course 2.007 includes:
a) Lecture 1: Design is a Passionate Process
b) Lecture 2: Creation of Ideas
c) Lecture 3: Fundamental Mechanical Design Principles
d) Lecture 4: Linkages
e) Lecture 5: Power Transmission Components
f) Lecture 6: Screws and Gears
g) Lecture 7: Force & Torque Sources
h) Lecture 8: Structures
i) Lecture 9: Structural Interfaces
j) Lecture 10: Types of Bearings
k) Lecture 11: Designing with Bearings

Copyright 2002, MIT.