Online Course for Mechanical CAD Education

Computer-aided design (CAD) is a known tool for all mechanical and civil engineers, and it has been utilized for decades to help carry out everyday engineering design tasks. The evolution of CAD software and various information technology tools, e.g. virtual/augmented reality or 3D printing, has broadened the amount of engineers utilizing CAD. While learning CAD is an essential part in the curriculum of mechanical or civil engineering, there is a growing interest for learning CAD in other engineering disciplines also. To extend our teaching to students from other disciplines, our teaching has to be freed from the scheduled classrooms. The development of learning management systems, with help of auto-assessment systems, allows creation of semi-autonomous courses. In traditional classroom teaching, the teacher can see the progress and the challenges in the learning during the contact sessions. In online teaching, more emphasis has to be put on the feedback and assessment methods.This paper presents the findings from the development of a place and time independent CAD course. The course teaches the basic tools and methods in the mechanical CAD education, starting from the creation of simple parts and ending with parametric design automatons. During the course, various tools are used to evaluate the student’s learning and to exchange feedback.