Materials Science Lab

The Materials and Manufacturing laboratories are spread through 7 rooms in the lower level of the Academic wing of the new engineering building at Texas A&M University at Qatar.  The rooms are assigned as follows: 052 – Optical Microscopy (360 ft²), 051 – Metallographic Specimen Preparation (540 ft²), 050 – Welding Operations (900 ft²), 048 – Mechanical Materials Testing (660 ft²), 047 – SEM, XRD, XRF (480 ft²), 046 – Heat Treatment (450 ft²), 045 – Foundry, Rapid Prototyping, and MTS (630 ft²).  A total of approximately 4,020 ft² is dedicated to the MEEN 360 laboratories. 

The laboratory session for MEEN 360 meets once a week during which, experiments are conducted to reinforce lecture concepts.  Typical experiments during the semester might include topics in heat treatment of steel, cold work and annealing, machining operations, welding processes, injection molding, and tensile testing, material hardness testing, fatigue testing, aging of materials and others.  The workstations have been designed to support up to 20 students working in teams of two or three. 

MEEN 360 laboratory facilities and equipment also supports other courses in Mechanical Engineering.  In particular, students in MEEN 404, a senior laboratory design course, frequently use the facilities.  Students in the senior design classes (MEEN 401 and 402) will use the facilities as they develop their projects for clients and need access to machining and testing equipment.  In particular, the rapid prototyping, injection-molding machine, machine tools, and testing apparatuses will see use.