In 2016, the Swarco Raiders Tirol – the local American Football Team – and the MCI started a unique collaboration. Under the motto "Let's win together", education and sport were harmonized just as it is known it to be in the USA. The partnership has since borne many advantages, such as free admission for students, alumni and MCI staff to home games and joint merchandise. However, the cooperation doesn’t stop here.
The collaboration started in a quite unusual way. The initial plan was to build a soccer ball launcher for a local soccer team. From this project, the idea of developing a machine, which could “throw” an American football, was initiated. However, throwing a ball shaped like an egg is much more complex than kicking a round ball. Building a machine, which imitates that motion, is a challenge, which the MCI Mechatronics Department happily accepted.
“From an engineering point of view, this is much more difficult because we are not dealing with around ball here, which means you cannot shoot it, but rather you have to throw it like a quarterback”, Dr. Andreas Mehrle, head of the Mechatronics Department, explains.
Some deserving students of the mechatronics department were able to be a part of the whole process, from planning and developing, right through to the completion of the project. Moreover, the intensive work and constant development have payed off in the end: the machine is ready to go and ready to throw!
It's incredible how quickly our students find successful solutions and put them into practice," says Mehrle proudly.
Exciting projects like these are on the agenda at the Mechatronics Department. The program offers students many interesting topics on which their bachelor and master theses can be based. However, it becomes even more exciting when students develop their own ideas for which solutions must be found for a wide variety of problems.
“If you have an interesting problem – irrespective of whether it is in engineering, medical engineering, sports engineering one – just come by. The worst thing that can happen is that we say no, but it would be much more likely that we’ll say yes.”
Therefore, if you are interested in technical topics such as these, mechatronics might be the right choice for you! Check out our homepage and get to know our study program. We hope to see you soon.
