Meet the Untouchables team!
Ben Lubbers
I am a senior electrical and computer engineering student at Calvin College and am a member of the
Untouchables design team. I have had two previous internships that have given me tools that I can use in
creating and designing this project. I have interned at D.C. Cook Nuclear Power Plant and TRW
Automotive the last two summers. At Cook Nuclear I worked on a modification project to the plant that
required the powering of a crane from a nearby power source. It gave me good insight into what needs to
be considered when powering certain tools and components. Some of these are breakers, wire mapping,
and phase coordination. At TRW Automotive I did testing of software and learned how to locate and
debug failures and unexpected results. I hope to use both of these experiences in helping me create this
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project. My role reflects my previous experience by allowing me to be in charge of powering the entire
system and help others by testing their components.
Ed Smilde
I am a senior engineering major with an electrical and computer concentration at Calvin College and
member of the Untouchables design team. I am most interested in object-oriented programming and
applied mathematics, the main experiences I will bring to the team. My role in the making of the touch
table will be handling the image processing, which will involve algorithms using some numerical analysis
of differential equations programmed in C++. I will be focused on the software on the machine, such as
the operating system and drivers for the cameras and touch screen, and writing some useful libraries and
demo applications to help showcase the power and usability of the device.
Nick Truer
I am a senior engineering student with an electrical and computer concentration at Calvin College and a
member of The Untouchables. I hope to bring my experience interning at both Twisthink and
DornerWorks to help manage and lead our team through the project. At DornerWorks I was responsible
for my own tasks on a project and I had customers that expected results by a certain timeframe and so I
have experience working with a schedule and can make sure that The Untouchables will stay on task. I
will be doing a lot of the overall concept design and work to schedule tasks and divide them up amongst
the team.
My current role in the project is defining the optical design requirements and how we will meet these as a
team. I began by researching various alternatives that can be used to produce our touch screen and then
selected the appropriate one for our project. I will be continuing with the optical design through building
and testing our touch screen and optics.
Michael Williams
I am a senior engineering student with a concentration in electrical and computer engineering, and as a
member of the Untouchables I would bring to the table interest and enthusiasm for designing the
hardware of our touch table. My role in the team is to develop the core hardware system that will be
running the touch system apparatus. After having built a computer as a hobby, developing this system
will provide me with a plethora of learning opportunities to further understand the computing
infrastructure.