The Mechanical Engineering Association (MEA) at BITS Pilani is gearing up for APOGEE 2023. In a recent interview with the APOGEE English Press, Ayush Shukla, the coordinator of MEA spoke about the various events that they are organizing, how they are incorporating the festival’s theme, and the challenges they faced during the preparation process.

MEA is organizing four technical events, Mechanix, Battle of Waterloo, Hydraulic Arm, and CAD-athon. Mechanix, a new version of their old event Full Throttle Grand Prix (FTGP), requires participants to build the perfect suspension setup for their RC car and beat other vehicles in a race that tests speed, suspension, and control. In Battle of Waterloo, participants must build a wireless remote-controlled boat that travels a specified race track in the least possible time. Hydraulic Arm is a new event where participants design and build a mechanical arm that will use hydraulics as a power source to lift and place lettered weights to form a word. Finally, CAD-athon is a real-world problem where participants must design a product, and solutions presented will be judged on primarily three parameters: uniqueness, feasibility, and cost-effectiveness.

The MEA has tried to keep the difficulty level of their technical events low so that more people can participate in them. Ayush believes that this can serve as a starting point for those interested in the field, and the prize money is an added incentive. During the interview, Ayush admitted that MEA faced a challenge while organizing Mechanix. Initially, it was made to be a robotics based event, and the prize structure in all was very different. 

Ayush also shared his experience as a coordinator and how he enjoyed getting work done from juniors. He appreciated the enthusiasm of freshers, who may lack technical know-how but make up for it in enthusiasm. He concluded by sharing that the MEA wished for participants to have fun and learn from their events.