Interview with Michael Kleinigger

Featured Engineer

Michael Kleinigger

Michael Kleinigger - Engine Controls Applications Engineer - John Deere Power Systems, Waterloo, Iowa

How did you get into electronics/ engineering and when did you start?

I’ve always been fascinated by gadgets of all types. Like a lot of kids destined to become scientists and engineers, I routinely frustrated my parents by taking apart phones, computers, appliances… you name it! I particularly enjoyed the challenge of fixing things that had broken, especially computers. I suppose my first real attempts at engineering were in the software realm. I spent quite a bit of my free time in high school writing programs and helping out on computer forums. During my first year of college at RPI, where I was pursuing a degree in computer and systems engineering, I began working with Dr. Kevin Craig in his Mechatronics Lab (now at Marquette University). He convinced me that electrical and mechanical engineering were more my cup of tea. I’m definitely glad that I followed his advice. I really love variety, and Mechatronics certainly provides that.

Tell us a bit about your educational and work background.

Just last August I graduated from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in Troy, NY with my MS in electrical engineering. For my graduate work I focused on both power electronics and control theory. For my undergraduate degree (also from RPI), I dual-majored in both electrical and mechanical engineering. While in college I held a number of different research and teaching positions. I worked in the RPI Mechatronics lab, the RPI Center for Automation Technologies and Systems, assisted in writing control software for RPI’s subsonic wind tunnel, and worked with the Formula Hybrid racing team. Designing and building a hybrid electric car in two semesters was unbelievably fun.

After graduating, I spent a few months looking for work. I received a number of offers though, and ultimately started working for John Deere in Waterloo, IA last December (2010). Currently I am the engine controls applications engineer for 4WD loaders. It’s a lot of desk-time, but every now and then I find an excuse to go out and operate some of our construction equipment. A few weeks ago I was in Fairplay, CO performing altitude testing on backhoes and loaders. That was great fun. At the same time I had the chance to operate a Deere 250G excavator. Now that’s exciting. If there’s one thing that puts a smile on my face, it’s operating a 30-ton piece of construction equipment.

What was your favorite course in college?

It’s tough to pick just one. I certainly enjoyed my introductory electric circuits course, primarily because of the excellent instruction I received from Dr. Don Millard. I had a blast with both of my thermal and fluid dynamics courses as well. What makes coursework enjoyable for me is the application of the material. If a professor can demonstrate that what he/she is teaching is relevant to problems I might be asked to solve, I’m all ears. Granted, it can be fun to learn for the sake of knowledge alone, but I get most passionate about learning things that make me a better and more useful problem-solver.

What are your favorite hardware tools that you use?

I don’t have many, but my two RPI IOBoards are by far my favorite tool. Just one of these boards can serve as a 1.5MSPS dual-channel oscilloscope, arbitrary waveform generator, and spectrum analyzer. For ninety-nine percent of my projects, this is plenty of bandwidth. One of my side projects in college was to develop LabVIEW drivers and interfaces for the IOBoard. So, I can now use this simple, USB-powered device like any other piece of commercially-available DAQ hardware.

What are your favorite software tools that you use?

Eureqa is definitely one of my favorites. It’s a very powerful tool for finding mathematical equations to fit a variety of datasets. I’ve used it to create empirical models of fuel cells, engines, sensors, etc. For PCB layout at home, I like CadSoft EAGLE. Its interface is excellent, and best of all, it’s free for non-commercial use. Oh and I use LabVIEW for just about everything. It’s really much more capable than a lot of people give it credit for. I’ve produced web interfaces, control systems, internet spiders, automated test programs, and more.

What is the hardest/trickiest bug you have ever fixed?

For my MS thesis, I designed and built a six degree-of-freedom sensor package for use in construction automation. After completing assembly on one of my PCB prototypes, I was shocked to see enormous oscillations in the output of one of the op-amp circuits. I probed, searched, and re-ran simulations for about a week, and found that at several points on the board the capacitance was much higher than expected. And yet, the values of the individual components were correct. Ultimately, I discovered the underlying problem: I had forgotten to connect the ground plane to ground. So basically I’d produced an enormous parallel-plate capacitor. After patching the ground plane into the rest of the ground circuit, everything worked fine. Lesson learned.

Do you have any tricks up your sleeve?

When wiring up a system, I like to use CAT5 cable for all sorts of things. It’s cheap, usually quickly available, and its twisted pairs help reduce noise. Most of my MS thesis was held together with CAT5. However, if I only need to connect two or three wires, but still want twisted pair, I’ll take one end of the wires and clamp it in a vice. Then I’ll stick the other end into the chuck of a cordless drill. Running the drill for twenty seconds will produce a nice tight twisted pair. Great trick I learned in college. I imagine a lot of folks here already know this though!

What has been your favorite project?

That’s a tough call. I guess I’d say that it was my very first project in the Mechatronics Lab – a thrust-vectoring inverted pendulum. It was designed to be used as a classroom demonstration of the control of an unstable system. I learned so much from that project that I’m still using today – LabVIEW, MATLAB, microcontroller programming, power electronics, mechanical dynamics, aerodynamics, angular position sensing. It’s just a wonder nobody was ever clipped by the unshielded propeller we started with…

Do you have any note-worthy engineering experiences?

One of my passions is renewable energy. When I was an undergrad, I spent a couple of years designing and building my own solar power and home automation system (in my free time). Ultimately I wound up with a pair of solar panels mounted to ballasted deck chairs on my balcony which produced about 130W in direct sunlight. Those panels fed a charge controller and about 1300Wh of lead acid batteries. My custom control system (a hybrid microcontroller & LabVIEW project) monitored the batteries and panels and could enable various outputs (lights and an inverter). An old laptop acted as a server for remote monitoring and control. I also threw in a ZWave wireless thermostat. So at the end of a long day at school, I’d whip out my BlackBerry, connect to my server, and tell it I’d be home in 10 minutes. By the time I arrived, the heat/AC would be running and the lights would be on. The server also acted as a stereo, which had its own web interface through which I could pull up thousands of tracks. Yep, I had a pretty good life in school. For more details on this project, check out these two blog posts (http://grieg.gotdns.com/blog/?p=87 and http://grieg.gotdns.com/blog/?p=150).

What are you currently working on?

On the hobbyist front, nothing terribly significant. I was hoping to start another solar power project, but that’s been put on hold. At work, I’m continuing to track down problems in engine controller software for John Deere 4WD loaders. I’ve also been developing tools for simulating engine-vehicle interaction on the bench. Again, more LabVIEW and AVR microcontrollers.

What direction do you see your business heading in the next few years?

As far as John Deere is concerned, the future is bright. Yes, the economy may be a bit sluggish at the moment, but Deere is engaged in four of the most reliable markets in the world: food production, water management, power generation, and construction. While construction may vary as the economy oscillates, people will always need food, water, and power. I personally feel a lot of job security in this.

When you’re not working on something technical, how do you like to spend your time?

I really enjoy spending time outdoors, preferably in very scenic areas (like Colorado, Yellowstone, the Adirondacks, etc). Hiking and running are two of my favorite activities. I’m into photography as well, and I rarely hike without my camera in one hand.