The following modules which I will review are taking in AY13/14, I will update them if possible.
Module 1: CN2116 (Chemical Kinetics and Reactor Design)
Brief Overview:
1) Kinetics (Differential, Integral, Power & Non-Power Law)
2) Reactor Design (PFR, CSTR, Single/Multiple Reactors, Isothermal Reactors)
3) Residence Time Distribution
4) Parameter Models (Segregation Model, Tank-In-Series, Dispersion, Compartments)
5) Heterogeneous Catalyst (Adsorption, Langmuir-Hinshelwood, Catalyst Deactivation)
6) Catalytic Reactor Design (Mass Transfer, Diffusivity)
Mode of Grading:
10% Assignments (Weekly Assignments)
2 x 20% CA (Open Book)
50% Finals (Open Book, 15 MCQ and 3 structured questions)
Lecturer:
Prof Lee Jim Yang
A/Prof Xie Jian Ping
***Update as of AY15/16
Only A/Prof Xie Jian Ping will lecture the module.
***Note: This module is also offered in Semester 1
The lecturers are Dr. Satyen Gautem and Dr. Eldin (for AY14/15)
Mode of grading is 10% class participation, 2x20% Midterms, 50% Finals
Comments:
This module is extremely important for your Design Project (CN4123) because there will always be a section for the "Reactor". Not only do you have to code it out, you must determine the various design parameters and whatnot for it, thus this module is very crucial for your design project.
Prof Lee Jim Yang will lecture 1 - 2 while A/Prof Xie Jian Ping lectures points 3 - 6, all lectures were webcasted. Prof Lee is a good lecturer because he makes the concepts very clear and concise. It is very important that you conceptualize the PFR and CSTR design because these will appear in your other modules like CN3421 (Process Modeling and Numerical Simulations), CN5172 (Biochemical Engineering) and other Technical Electives and of course CN4123 (Design Project). A/Prof Xie Jian Ping goes more into catalytic reactors which can get a little confusing because there are so many things he has to go through and sometimes he tends to speed up. Thus, you may want to read before going for his lecture or spend time to internalize it. Most of it has some links to your CN2125 (Heat and Mass Transfer) concept, so it should not be too bad.
The weekly assignments can be rather tough, Prof Lee's ones tend to take quite a lot of time to solve while A/Prof Xie's ones are a little better. You can discuss with your friends and hand up the same answer (Like 1 answer sheet with all your names on it). The midterms were pretty straightfoward and doable. The finals were very tricky for Prof Lee's part because its about 15 MCQ and the answers tend to be close to each other, so stay sharp. A/Prof Xie's part is quite doable as long as you understand what is going on in the lecture notes and if you do your tutorials and assignments.
Module 2: CN2125 (Heat and Mass Transfer)
Brief Overview:
1) Fundamentals of Heat Transfer (Conduction, Convection, Radiation)
2) Steady and Unsteady State Conduction
3) Convective Heat Transfer and Correlations
4) Boiling and Condensation
5) Molecular Diffusion and Convective Mass Transfer
6) Radiation
Mode of Grading:15% CA (3 Homework Assignments and 1 Mini-Project)
25% Test (2 Tests, both are after recess week, one week 7 the other week 12 for my year)
60% Finals (Open Book, about 10 structured questions)
Lecturer:
Prof Wang Chi-Hwa
A/Prof Praveen Linga
Comments:
As I did mention in my module review for MA1506, you will see a lot of ODEs and boundary conditions for this module. It is quite manageable in my opinion as long as you attempt the tutorial questions and listen during the lecture (They are webcasted too). The homework assignments are based off the textbook's questions, so if you have the solutions, it should be easy. The mini-project is to use heat transfer concepts in real life applications, the easiest of course is cooking. For my year, Prof Wang set one of the tests as a noodle-cooking question and used it as an example of what the project should be like. So basically, you use the heat transfer models and apply it to anything in real life. Mine was a chocolate lava cake so it was quite interesting because you had to hit the right temperature and right timing to make it.
Prof Wang is a very entertaining lecturer who does his best to make the concepts understandable. For tutorials, Prof Wang will ask you to present the answers, so make sure you do them! Some of his jokes are really cold at times and he likes to introduce the numerical constants (Reynold's Number, Pradtl's Number etc.) as "friends". And trust me, you will make a lot of these "friends". You may want to make your own "cheatsheet" to summarize the millions of equations and whatnot for the finals to avoid wasting time flipping the textbook. A/Prof Praveen is a decent lecturer but he likes to say his questions are "very easy", don't fall that trap, it is still quite challenging. For this module, I strongly recommend you summarize the formulas and whatnot in a "cheatsheet" and learn how to use the graphs that are provided to solve the questions. Hence, doing your tutorials will help greatly for this module.
Module 3: CN2108 (Chemical Engineering Laboratory I)
Brief Overview:
6 Labs based on Biochemistry, Thermodynamics and Fluid Mechanics (2 labs each).
Mode of Grading:60% Lab report (10% per report)
25% Viva (On-the-spot questions)
10% Safety Test (You will take this before you do your lab)
5% Peer Review
Lecturer:
Dr. Karthiga will lecture on safety.
Comments:
A very deceiving module that is 2MC but is actually super annoying and tiring. The experiments are quite straightforward except the biochem ones because half the things you use are probably not taught. For your lab report, format it neatly and answer all the discussion questions in your experiment sheet provided in as much detail as you can. If you have not enough space to write your report, you can always consider throwing the graphs into the appendix. As long as you put in effort, it is very easy to score an A for this module. You will be grouped with 2-3 other students and it is based on the luck-of-the-draw. One of the guys in my lab was very helpful and cooperative while the other person was rather lazy and always handed her part super last minute for me to compile. Therefore, if you don't trust your teammates, just do the whole report yourself, if you spend 1 day sitting down and typing it out, you should be able to finish it.
For the lab viva, I strongly recommend you ask Mr. Qin Zhen any question before the viva itself. Mr. Qin Zhen usually wears a blue lab coat and will walk around the lab to help you if you need assistance, the TAs don't usually know whats going on so don't bother, only one or two bother to teach and help you usually. Make sure you know what the experiment is about, the theoretical information and most importantly the assumptions made. For the bio labs, you are expected to know how the machine functions, what are the substances used (like for MALDI-TOV, HPLC etc.) and their limitations. The person who conducted the viva is Dr. Satyen Gautum, he is very forgiving and usually guides you to the answer if you are unsure. Even if you falter, take it as a learning opportunity.
Module 4: CN3124 (Particle Technology)
Brief Overview:
1) Particle Size Analysis
2) Sedimentation
3) Packed Beds and Filtration
4) Fluidization
5) Pneumatic Transport
6) Gas Cyclones
Mode of Grading:2x 10% Quiz (Open Book)
20% Project
60% Finals (Open Book)
Lecturer:
Dr. Eldin Lim
Comments:
This module's content is not too much things to digest honestly. It is mainly a more advanced form of fluid mechanics. Dr. Eldin is a very good lecturer who guides your understanding and provides videos during the lecture to help you visualize the concepts. Sadly, for this module there is no webcast so you may miss out some of his points during lecture. Fortunately, Dr. Eldin is very approachable and helpful so feel free to consult him if you are unsure of anything. He replies emails rather promptly so it is usually easy to book a consultation slot with him. He was even nice enough to provide his contact number and skype (which I will not be posting here in due respect of his privacy). I really respect Dr. Eldin because he is a very rare professor who actually cares and sympathizes with the students.
The quizzes are quite manageable, as long as you listen in lecture, it should be doable. The project is rather hard because it involves you writing something like a mini-research paper. You can take any of the topics provided in a list and write a mini research paper on it, it can be a little rigorous but I strongly encourage you to do it, especially as preparation for your FYP CN4118R. It exposes you to what a research paper looks like, how to do actual research and deeper understanding of the module. Find the correct teammates because this can be quite time-consuming, as usual my group had muggers who were busy studying so me and the other 2 guys soloed this.
The finals set by Dr. Eldin are meant to kill you, so don't be too discouraged if you couldn't finish the paper. For AY13/14 he set 4 questions, 1 involving integration with fluidization (it was a real nightmare and consisted of 40 marks!!!), 1 dealing with filtration, 1 packed bed (I think) and the last was gas cyclone. They are extremely difficult to do so I strongly recommend for his papers, don't hog on one question, just do as many as you can.
Module 5: CN3135 (Process Safety, Health and Environment)
Brief Overview:
1) Toxicology and Probits
2) Dispersion Modelling (Plume, Plum etc.)
3) Flammability
4) HAZOP
5) Fault Trees, Reliability and Conditional Probabilities
6) Life Cycle Assessment and Sustainability
Mode of Grading:
20% Take Home Quiz
20% HAZOP Project
60% Finals (Open Book)
***NOTE: This module is supposed to be taken in Semester 1 so the grading may differ. From what my friends told me, it is the same only that the Take Home Quiz was changed to Midterm.
Lecturer:
Prof Reginald Tan
***For Semester 1, I heard the lecturers are all guest lecturers, not from the faculty.
Comments:
This module is very calculation-intensive and there are a lot of models, constants, graphs, formulas etc. that you need to refer to during the exam and lecture, so it is strongly recommend you buy the textbook and bring it for the lecture, otherwise you will only see the formula in your lecture notes as "Equation XXX" or "Refer to Page XXX". Most of the concepts learnt are based on engineering design philosophies and may require you to have some basic understanding of process control, separation process, fluid mechanics and heat/mass transfer. Therefore, taking it in Year 2 may pose some challenges but I still managed it quite well.
Prof Reginald can be a little soft during the lecture so consider sitting in the front rows, no webcast too. He explains the concepts very well and sometimes provides videos to show some safety-related incidents in real life plants (You will come across some of it in EG2401 too). His questions for the exams are quite straightforward as well. It is mainly 2 structured questions and 1 mini-essay question. As long as you have done his tutorials and don't be careless, you should be able to do well for this module.
Module 6: ES2331 (Communicating Engineering)
Brief Overview:
This module is aimed to help you attain the relevant presentation skills to help your other modules, in particular your FYP. Some techniques will be taught to you and the way the class may be structured will be varied because there are many tutors for this module so their way of teaching may change.
Mode of Grading:
20% Class Participation
35% CEP 1 (Panel Discussion)
35% CEP 2 (Speech)
2 x 5% Reflection (After CEP 1 and 2)
Lecturer:
Ms Amy Toh
Comments:
As stated earlier, this module is mainly aimed to improve your presentation skills. For your panel discussion and speech, you are expected to do some engineering-related topic unfortunately, so sadly no philosophy, sociology, politics, psychology, economics etc. (SIGHS, yes its a huge disappointment for me).
For your panel discussion, there will be 4 topics to discuss on. You have to also conduct an interview with an engineer prior to this panel discussion (Try to find your relative or something). You will want to read up beforehand some of the relevant news related to your topic and more importantly, use the transition words the tutor taught. You must try not to be too dominant in the panel discussion and don't talk rubbish/smoke/deviate from the topic because its very easily detectable.
For your speech, you must select any one engineering topic to speak on. Typical presentation skills needed to score well, use analogies, dress up (you may get penalized if you don't) and make the content fun and enjoyable!
Reflections are not too hard to do, just follow the samples given. For class participation, there will always be those "wayang" kings/queens who will keep trying to suck up to the teacher for marks. One of my classmates wayang to the extent that he gave the teacher chocolates. Just answer questions whenever you feel comfortable and answer them relevantly, don't smoke and go off topic too. Very chill module, so should not put too much stress on it.
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