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HIT holds NESAC 2017 Preliminaries

Christine Juta Scoops First Prize in HIT 2017 Pre- NESAC Finals

HIT holds NESAC 2017 PreliminariesChristine Juta, a final year Electronic Engineering student won the first prize in the HIT 2017 Pre-National Engineering Students Awards Competitions (NESAC) oral presentations while Kudakwashe Pasurayi from the Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering department also came first in the poster presentations.

Tariro Musarurwa and Tonderai Kadengwa were the first runners-up in the oral and poster presentations respectively.

The HIT 2017 Pre-National Engineering Students Awards Competitions (NESAC) was held on 14 June. The competition draws together twelve best final year engineering students’ projects presented by students from four engineering departments in the School of Engineering and Technology.

The first prizewinners and runners up in the two categories earn a place to compete in the National Engineering Students Awards Competitions (NESAC) scheduled for August at the University of Zimbabwe. The competitions are organized and sponsored by the Zimbabwe Institution of Engineers (ZIE) and the Engineering Council of Zimbabwe (ECZ).

All the projects presented by the students are aimed at proffering practical engineering to industry needs and ultimately towards national development.

HIT holds NESAC 2017 PreliminariesChristine Juta’s project is entitled – "Development of a test rig for automated driving test track". In this test rig for automated driving test, LASER diodes produce unidirectional beams that will be superimposed on the road markings on a dedicated test track. The main objective is to minimize the role of the human instructor in determining the result of a driving test. Each LASER diode corresponds to a light dependent resistor (LDR). Once the motorist obstructs the LASER beam, the light dependent resistor (LDR) detects no light and the corresponding PIC18F452 microcontroller pin goes low. This would mean the motorist has either failed to manoeuvre in alley docking, failed to complete the hill start, failed to successfully complete parallel parking or failed to correctly observe the traffic light. Any of which implies the motorist has failed the driving test. Should each stage be completed successfully, the motorist is permitted to proceed to the next stage.  These results will be transmitted serially, via USB to TTL cable. A C# application, developed using Visual Studio, provides the Graphic User Interface, which enables the VID official to observe the progress of the test in real time. The electronic circuits were designed with the computer aided design tools Proteus 8.5 and Kicad. The microcontroller software was written in C language using MikroC PIC development software.

"I am passionate about women leadership and women in engineering especially in the field of electronic engineering. We are only six ladies in a class of 40 students, so I took it as a challenge to come up with this project and make a mark as an aspiring female engineer. I am sure this will motivate other female students in my department and at HIT," said Juta.

Kudakwashe Pasurayi’s poster presentation was entitled "Design optimization of wet spent grain drying system

"I am overwhelmed by this achievement and I am going to continue working on developing the system to improve its accuracy. I will also work to seek venture capital for the commercialisation of my project design", he said

All the contestants who participated in the preliminary-finals were from the School of Engineering and Technology.

HIT holds NESAC 2017 PreliminariesTariro Musarurwa from the Chemical and Process Systems Engineering department came second in the oral presentations with his project on the "Design of a plant to recover gold from tailings with a throughput of 2160 tpd using activated carbon-magnesium oxide (c-mgo) nanocomposite as adsorbent", while Tonderai Kadengwa from the same department also came second in the chart presentations with his project entitled "Design of 120 m3/hr water treatment plant using bone char bio-adsorption technology for water de-fluoridation".

The other contestants in the oral presentations were Evidence Mandizvidza, Irene Gwenje, Tamuka Muchena, and Dale Farai Gwenzi. John Chitsaka, Innocent Mafusire, and Praise Sinamawiri were the other contestants in the chart presentations.

A panel of judges comprising engineers from the Zimbabwe Institution of Engineers (ZIE), Engineering Council of Zimbabwe (ECZ) Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries (CZI), Scientific and Industrial Research and Development Centre as well as the Zimbabwe Manpower Development Fund (ZIMDEF) adjudicated the competitions.

In her opening remarks, Acting Dean in the School of Engineering and Technology Prof L. Tichagwa paid special tribute to the organisers of this event, the Zimbabwe Institution of Engineers (ZIE) and the Engineering Council of Zimbabwe (ECZ) for sponsoring these competitions.

In a speech read on his behalf, Guest of Honour Engineer Ben Rafemoyo, the Chief Executive Officer of the Engineering Council of Zimbabwe (ECZ) challenged engineering students to play a role in the industrialisation and modernisation of Zimbabwe. "As young engineers, the great question which should occupy our minds should be: what role can I play in the transformation of my country to aid industrialisation and modernisation? How can I provide engineering solutions that will address issues of beneficiation and value addition?  It is my sincere hope that it is these valid and important questions which have guided your work over the past few years and which I hope will form the basis of your future endeavours", he said.

HIT holds NESAC 2017 PreliminariesEng. Rafemoyo also called on engineering students to pay attention to issues of climate change, the development of smart cities, the strengthening of the small to medium enterprise sector, and the ever increasing need for gender mainstreaming as well as the inclusion of the youth, who form over 70 percent of Africa’s population.

NESAC is a brainchild of the Zimbabwe Institution of Engineers, aimed at promoting innovation, research and development among tertiary education engineering institutions; with a vision of connecting them to industry. The purpose of the competition is to recognise and promote innovation and practical engineering solutions through undergraduate engineering students’ projects. This platform brings together the intellect from various engineering disciplines in an effort to showcase innovation that is key to Zimbabwe’s industrial development and advancement of technology.

Harare Institute of Technology has won the NESAC Finals in two consecutive years, (2014 and 2015).

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