| The authors of the Third Edition joined the faculty of the Department of Electrical Engineering at the University of Cincinnati within three months of each other, and collaborated on a number of academic projects during the ensuing years. In addition, we were co-editors of the Handbook of Electric Motors, published by Marcel Dekker, Inc., in 1995. In the early years of our careers, we both taught design courses at various times, but subsequently Dr. Middendorf became much more heavily involved with instruction in the design area because of his wide-ranging consulting work in the electromechanical product design field. Most of his consulting work was concentrated in the design of small circuit breakers, including production, testing, and approval by Underwriters Laboratories (UL). This work led on into investigations into the field of insulation. |
| During the same time frame, Professor Engelmann did consulting work in mechanical and electromechanical design, but with a much different emphasis than that of Dr. Middendorf. Most of his consulting work involved the design of large one or two of a kind machines, including deformation generators for rolling reinforcing rod and the drive systems and controls for large lathes, machines used in the steel industry for turning as-cast rolls for rolling mills. He was also retained for a number of years for the design of small automatic control systems, including both analog and digital systems. |
| We both recognized early on the importance of feasibility studies, of patents, the need to be able to create alternative designs and to invent, the usefulness of various models, the fact that much of a design project requires that informed decisions must be made at every turn, and that all of these facets of a design project required knowledge of optimum design procedures, reliability, and testing. Both of us were also sought after as experts in product liability cases (in one case on opposite sides of the same case), reinforcing our recognition of the importance of standards and of the ability to provide clear and concise testimony. All of this experience has shaped the content of this work. As might be expected, the experience of the senior author (Dr. Middendorf) has been the dominant factor in this work because the first two editions were his work alone, but this edition includes examples drawn from the experience of Professor Engelmann as well. |
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