The PLOrk Biography

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Musical instruments have long been on the cutting edge of technology, often spurring new research and development. At Princeton, we have been exploring ways in which the computer can be integrated into conventional music-making contexts (chamber ensembles, jam sessions, etc…) while also radically transforming those contexts. This has involved developing new speaker systems that have a more instrument-like presence, human-computer interfacing designs that involve performers physically the way musical instruments do, and software [1|2|3] to link the performer’s bodies to sound. In the past, we have explored these ideas with small groups of people (2-3), and in the Fall of 2005 we initiated the Princeton Laptop Orchestra to extend these ideas to larger groups (15), using the orchestra (in a very general sense) as a model.

This is definitely an innovative way of thinking of music. In case you want to see video footage, check out this youtube clip!

 

The Princeton Laptop Orchestra (PLOrk) is a newly established ensemble of computer-based musical meta-instruments. Each instrument consists of a laptop, a multi-channel hemispherical speaker, and a variety of control devices (keyboards, graphics tablets, sensors, etc…). The students who make up the ensemble act as performers, researchers, composers, and software developers. The challenges are many: what kinds of sounds can we create? how can we physically control these sounds? how do we compose with these sounds? There are also social questions with musical and technical ramifications: how do we organize a dozen players in this context? with a conductor? via a wireless network?

The following image is a view of the orchestra set up before their debut concert:

 

 

 

by Hilary Parker

As junior Nick Frey sat in his fluid mechanics course last spring, he was thinking about bicycles — but he wasn’t daydreaming.

Rather, the mechanical and aerospace engineering major was conjuring ways to put his newfound knowledge to work in modifications to his racing bike. The reigning national time-trial champion and co-president of the University cycling team, Frey has aerodynamic aspirations that go far beyond taping the vents on his helmet — a common practice among racing cyclists to reduce wind resistance.

 

The day before heading to the world championships in Germany this fall, Princeton junior Nick Frey put himself through a grueling test to simulate the upcoming race route. He records distance, speed, cadence and power output during workouts like these in the Dillon Gymnasium bike room to determine his best racing strategy. Photo by Denise Applewhite“Nick was one of the most active students in my class — always wanting to know more details, or to make sure he understood everything,” said Alexander Smits, the chair of mechanical and aerospace engineering and Frey’s fluid mechanics professor. “It was great to have him in the class. He bemoaned the fact that Barrie Royce and I were no longer offering our freshman course, ‘The Bicycle and the Engineer,’ but he seems to have put his fluid dynamics know-how to very good use.”

A prime example is the modification Frey made to house the brake cables on his time-trial bike. When he learned that solid cylinders have high air resistance, Frey equated cylinders with bicycle brake cables — and saw an opportunity to go faster.

He knew that once an object, such as a cyclist, is moving fast enough, the main barrier to going even faster is wind resistance; nearly all the cyclist’s strength goes into pushing aside air. Conversely, reducing that resistance by a relatively small amount can result in major increases in speed with minimal increased effort. So Frey enclosed his brake cables in a special housing shaped like an airplane wing that shields them from the wind, reducing the resistance on his bike while still meeting the requirements of the organization that oversees competitive cycling events throughout the world, the Union Cycliste Internationale.

“It’s like free speed,” said Frey, a junior. “And in cycling, every second counts.”

Frey speaks from experience — in July, he won the 2007 U.S. Espoir National Time Trial for men under age 23 by 1.3 seconds.

His passion for cycling began when Frey was 14, growing up in Des Moines, Iowa. He got his first mountain bike, he recalls, and immediately became “obsessed” with the gear.

“We call it ‘getting geeked out’ in the cycling world,” he says. “So, I guess I would say I was an engineer before a cyclist. The cool gadgetry of cycling got me interested in the sport.”

A mountain-biking buddy introduced him to racing the following year. Frey promptly took sixth place at the junior national championship, and that was it. He was hooked.

After arriving at Princeton, Frey began to apply his engineering skills to his cycling. His extensive research pervades his cycling equipment, from the helmet he purchased to match his riding posture to the silicon gel between his wheel rims and tires that subtly changes the shape of his tires, making them more aerodynamic.

Even his own performance is subject to rigorous analysis. During tests in the bike room in Dillon Gymnasium, with his bike on stationary mounts and recordings of previous Tours de France on the television in front of him, Frey measures all aspects of performance. Distance and speed are just the beginning: He also records cadence and power output and creates complex graphs of the data to analyze his rides. He posts his training and performance results, along with details about various races, on his blog.

 

After a hard midday ride, Frey hangs up his bike and checks the power meter one last time. Photo by Denise ApplewhiteAll the top professional cyclists obtain similar information about their own performances, but they don’t usually do the analyses themselves. Frey prefers it his way, feeling that it gives him an extra edge as he strategizes for upcoming races.

During this summer’s national time trial race, his average speed was around 30 miles per hour for just about 30 minutes. He calculated that his average power for a 15-minute period during the race was 377 watts, just over half of a horsepower. This performance landed him a chance to compete in the Sept. 26 world championship time trial in Stuttgart, Germany.

In preparation for the competition, Frey conducted a series of tests to determine his best racing strategy. The day before leaving for Germany, he simulated riding up a major hill on the actual race route.

“I wanted to determine the maximum intensity I can put out when I’m going up the hill without overdoing it,” he said, after finishing the test. “If I figure out the power output I should maintain, it’ll be kind of like playing a little video game at the race — staring at my power monitor as I go up the hill. If you don’t know how hard to go, it’s easy to hit the hill way too fast and your legs’ll be toast by the time you get to the top.”

At the world competition, Frey had the opportunity to share rides and meals with some of the top cyclists in the world, including fellow Iowan Jason McCartney and Dave Zabriskie. Zabriskie is one of only three Americans ever to wear the leader’s yellow jersey in the Tour de France.

“It’s so amazing to see that these guys are doing the same thing I’m doing — they’re just bike riders,” he said. “It’s so inspirational. They show you that if you’ve got some talent and luck, and if you stick with it, you can get to their level. McCartney trained on the same awful roads that I did in Iowa — it’s so cool to think about what is possible.”

Spending time with these professional riders and hearing about their past competitions helped shape the way that Frey reacted to his performance at the world championship, where he took 57th place.

“At first, I was really disappointed, mainly because I felt like I let down all these people who were supporting me — my parents, the U.S. team, the mechanics,” he said. “But then, I realized that they understand that everyone can have really amazing rides and really bad rides, and so then I was really happy that I got to worlds in the first place. And then, right away, I started to think about what I’ll do differently next year — because I plan on getting there again next year.”

His plan for his future extends beyond training strategies to professional ambitions that combine his interests in engineering and cycling. His goal is to start a company that designs cycling gear, accessories and gadgets that push the limits of speed or enhance the sport of cycling. He is honing his product design and marketing skills this semester in “Entrepreneurial Engineering,” a course taught by Daniel Nosenchuck, an associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering.

Frey previously gained valuable experience in product design this summer in an internship at Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp. in Boulder, Colo. Working with a team of engineers, Frey helped design the electronics packaging for a future satellite.

“I approached it the same way I’ve been taught to approach problems in engineering classes, by being open to nontraditional solutions,” he said. This open-minded attitude allowed him to contribute new ideas to a team of many longtime engineers.

With the world championship behind him, Frey took an unprecedented two weeks off from riding his bike, even just to class. Though his newfound, albeit brief, status as a pedestrian resulted in his being late to class a time or two, he said it was the best way to recover from the tough summer of racing and ready his body for next year’s competitions.

During his normal cycling regimen, he’ll spend between 20 and 25 hours on his bike each week, often riding with his teammates on the cycling team. At other times, he’ll take off by himself, with no firm plans for where he’ll ride, not sure of much more than how long he plans to spend on his bike. His circuitous routes often take him through the New Jersey towns of Frenchtown and Ringoes, or across the Delaware River to Doylestown, Pa.

“I don’t start out with a laundry list of things to do, because then it feels more like a job and I want to enjoy what I’m doing,” he said. “It’s not that complicated,” he added, before sharing his personal philosophy: “Get on the bike and ride.”

For their senior design project, mechanical engineering undergraduates Adam Schumacher, Kevin King and Mike Kloosterboer are reconfiguring an electric motor to couple with a standard snowmobile chassis. The UW-Madison Clean Snowmobile Team will race the electric sled in March in the Society of Automotive Engineers Zero-Emissions Electric Snowmobile Event (Large image)

Thanks to donations from Madison-based foundations and industry, a team of University of Wisconsin-Madison mechanical engineers will have the chance to develop an earth-friendly snowmobile that could facilitate scientific research in Antarctica and Greenland.

Christened the Silent BuckEV, the electric sled will compete in the 2008 Society of Automotive Engineering Zero-Emissions Electric Snowmobile Event, to be held on the Michigan Technological University campus in March.

UW-Madison team faculty adviser Glenn Bower, a faculty associate in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, says the team appreciates the support from donors. This month, the Brittingham Foundation donated $13,000 and Polaris Industries supplied a snowmobile chassis, valued at $4,000. In May, the Evjue Foundation, the charitable arm of Madison newspaper The Capital Times, donated $13,000.

“The support has really made it possible to do the project,” Bower says. “We couldn’t have undertaken the task without outside funds.”

Though this is the UW-Madison team’s first year in the zero-emissions event, the team is familiar with snowmobiles. With its hybrid-electric snowmobile, UW-Madison has participated in the SAE Clean Snowmobile Challenge since 2002 and claimed first place in 2004 and 2006.

The zero-emissions event is different because the snowmobiles are completely electric. SAE partnered with the National Science Foundation for the event on behalf of a request by VECO Polar Resources, NSF support contractor in Greenland.

The students disassembled an electric motor and will rebuild it to power the snowmobile. (Large image)

The goal for zero-emissions teams is to help scientific research in Greenland and Antarctica. Air and snow samples can be contaminated by gas-powered vehicles used to get scientists to the coring spots. “Dog sleds are their only other option at this point,” Bower says.

In the past, NSF has sponsored zero-emissions teams to travel to Summit Station, Greenland, says Bower.

The zero-emissions competitions began in 2004, but so far the entries haven’t been electrically safe or reliable overall, according to Bower. UW-Madison has worked on hybrid vehicles since 1993 through U.S. Department of Energy student challenges; as a result, says Bower, the students are familiar with the high-voltage motors and batteries used in the snowmobile events.

“We’re just applying knowledge we already have to a snowmobile chassis, and then we make it very reliable,” Bower says.

He and team co-adviser, Ethan Brodsky, an assistant scientist in the Departments of Radiology and Medical Physics, contribute more than 20 years of leadership and experience in hybrid vehicles to the UW-Madison team.

Students also bring experience to the team and have their own goals for the zero-emissions project. Adam Schumacher, a senior mechanical engineering student, has been involved with the clean snowmobile team for four years and currently is modeling where the electric motor will be positioned in the chassis.

“I’ve been a snowmobile enthusiast since I was a kid,” Schumacher says. “Snowmobiling is currently facing restrictions because of noise pollution and greenhouse gases, and by being on this team, I can work to keep that from happening.”

Michael Maney, also a senior mechanical engineering student, says the snowmobile team is great hands-on experience for a lot of students. A former snowmobile racer, Maney says the best part is learning the entire design process. “Modeling, fabricating, putting it together and seeing how it does in the real world—you do it all,” he says.

The competition has several categories, including weight, acceleration and sound tests. Additional categories include a distance race, maneuverability course, technical paper and cost analysis. Also, industry experts drive and evaluate the snowmobiles. “Hopefully NSF will look at our snowmobile and say, ‘That’s a great job,’” Bower says.

—Sandra Knisely