by Linda Miller
posted December 21, 2004
) Photo by Linda Miller Engineering technology students Kevin Ensley, left, and Richard Thompson pose with the digital Christmas-tree "choir" built in their digital electronics course and now starring in a Chattanooga State greeting on Comcast Cable Channel 3. At center left is technical assistant Michael Vickery with Ron Reese, assistant professor of engineering technology. Click to enlarge. |
Then, simultaneously, the constructions begin to chime, “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” and flash tiny red, green and white lights in Christmas-tree shapes. From the dim surroundings, two engineering technology students call out, “Seasons greetings to all from the engineering technology students at Chattanooga State!”
Watching bystanders clap, the students laugh, and the digital electronic Christmas “choir” continues to flash and chime.
Soon the just-videotaped greeting from the engineering students at Chattanooga State Technical Community College—featuring their fall semester Christmas tree project—will be seen on Comcast Cable Channel 3.
The digital Christmas tree choir sprouted roots early last September when Ron Reese, an assistant professor of electrical/electronic engineering technology at the college, decided his freshmen students in the digital electronics course needed more hands-on laboratory experience, more as in some flashing lights, some holiday spirit and some art.
So Ron designed a lab project in the shape of a simply-shaped, flat electronic Christmas tree composed of three digital integrated circuits controlling 10 red LED’s (that would be light-emitting diodes). The point was for the students to learn techniques associated with integrated circuits to make the lights flash.
Each student built “and got to take home his very own” flashing light Christmas tree, a successfully achieved electrical engineering technology project.
“It may look simple when you see it, but the project demonstrates an entire semester of electrical engineering technology theory and practice—if a student’s Christmas tree doesn’t flash correctly, no A!” says Mr. Reese, 15-year veteran of teaching engineering technology.
Student Richard Thompson (Ooltewah High School, 1988) voiced the video greeting with fellow student Kevin L. Ensley (Northwest Georgia High School, 1995). Both are career-changers because, as Richard explained, “It’s time to start getting something better.” Then, with a smile, he added, “I’m not exactly sure where this is going to lead me….”
The project was, Kevin said, “a lot easier than I thought it would be, but a lot harder than I thought it would be, if that makes sense.”
Kevin said that when Ron Reese described the Christmas tree lab challenge, “I thought it would be really interesting to work on a printed circuit board.” Then he laughed and said, “It might make me famous!”
Richard and Kevin agreed that actually building their respective digital Christmas trees took only about three and one half to four hours. Their real challenges were learning the theories and techniques involved, and writing their “how it works” follow-up reports. Along with, that is, the patience required to drill press 120 holes in each Christmas tree’s printed circuit board.
The Digital Christmas Tree Project, however, became the Great Digital Christmas Tree Project as the 16 students in the course grew more interested.
“I made the mistake,” Ron Reese says, smiling, “of mentioning that the micro-controller chip the students would study in their sophomore class could do all the functions their little trees were doing, plus play a tune.
“Having said that, the students obligated me to show that it could be done and to show the real power of the microcontroller chip.
“If that weren’t enough, I decided to double the number of LED’s by using red and green bi-color LED’s and a star that flickers.
“So, my technical assistant, Michael Vickery, and I built the microcontrolled Christmas tree together. I designed the circuit; he designed the printed circuit board. I got the software for the LED’s written, and he wrote the software to generate the music tones. Then, we downloaded note frequency tables from the Internet, so that we could generate the exact tones for each note. Then, we got the sheet music for each song we wanted from the Internet and programmed the notes into the microcontroller.
“Our real challenge was to set the note tone, the note duration, digital vibrato, the light flash pattern and—you’ll like this one—the light multiplexing timing, so that none of the functions interferes with the other!
“When we got that done, we decided we would make the star on the tree flicker at three different intensities randomly.”
Although Ron and Michael obviously enjoyed showing off their Christmas design skills, “The real purpose was to familiarize ourselves and the students with the chip and the processes, and to demonstrate to the students how much a single microcontroller can do at one time.”
Ron says his electrical digital circuits students are already eager to continue their design experiments in part two of the course—could it be a robotic Easter bunny distributing light-flashing eggs that musically render “Here Comes Peter Cotton Tail”?
For more information on Chattanooga State’s two-year engineering technology career programs, contact Ron Reese at 423-697-4725 or e-mail ron.reese@chattanoogastate.edu. He’s away for the holidays resting up from the Great Digital Christmas Tree Project, so expect to hear from him in January.
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