MECH&AE 102
Dynamics of Particles and Rigid Bodies
Description: Lecture, four hours; discussion, two hours; outside study, six hours. Requisites: course 101, Mathematics 33A, Physics 1A. Fundamental concepts of Newtonian mechanics. Kinematics and kinetics of particles and rigid bodies in two and three dimensions. Impulse-momentum and work-energy relationships. Applications. Letter grading.
Units: 4.0
Units: 4.0
1 of 1
Most Helpful Review
Spring 2020 - DISCLAIMER: I took this class during Rona Szn so formatting could be very different for in person. Davoyan is getting a lot of hate from this quarter but I didn't think he was that bad. The format of the class for this rona quarter was 20% MT1, 20% MT2, 20% Final Exam, 40% Homework (there were two types of homework.) Lectures were not helpful at all, I didn't go after the couple of weeks but the material is heavily based off of 1A knowledge so using google and the textbook I was able to mostly teach myself what I needed to know. The midterms were kind of easy cause they were half problems directly from the textbook and the other half was super open ended that he came up with himself. Since each test was only 20% of your grade, we had a whole week to do it (he even said you could google stuff if you needed help,) and the test was worth 110%, it was super low stress. The homework was divided into two types, Type 1 which were just problems directly from the textbook (all on Slader) and Type 2. A lot of people didn't enjoy the Type 2 homeworks but I thought it was pretty interesting. There were only about 5 of the Type 2 assignments and half of those required MATLAB. It wasn't anything too hard, just plotting equations and derivatives of equations, I had zero MATLAB knowledge but using YouTube it wasn't even that bad. There was one MATLAB problem which no one really knew how to do, but when it comes down to it that problem was worth at most 0.5% of your grade so there was no point stressing about it. The majority of the Type 2 homework problems was just reading an article or watching a YouTube video and writing down interesting things. The final was only one problem and we had a week to do it, but it was essentially using everything we learned to talk through how one would plot the landing of a Falcon 9 booster. Personally I though this was sick and an awesome way to test our knowledge, but a lot of people didn't like it. Professor Davoyan seemed like a cool dude to me but didn't have the best social cues so I guess might have come across as rude. Honestly I would recommend this class cause I thought it was a refreshing approach on engineering classes that emphasized being independent and developing engineering skills on your own. TL;DR: I wouldn't take this class if you prefer a typical class experience where you just need equations to get by, but if you want to be more independent and develop real engineering thinking, would highly recommend.
Spring 2020 - DISCLAIMER: I took this class during Rona Szn so formatting could be very different for in person. Davoyan is getting a lot of hate from this quarter but I didn't think he was that bad. The format of the class for this rona quarter was 20% MT1, 20% MT2, 20% Final Exam, 40% Homework (there were two types of homework.) Lectures were not helpful at all, I didn't go after the couple of weeks but the material is heavily based off of 1A knowledge so using google and the textbook I was able to mostly teach myself what I needed to know. The midterms were kind of easy cause they were half problems directly from the textbook and the other half was super open ended that he came up with himself. Since each test was only 20% of your grade, we had a whole week to do it (he even said you could google stuff if you needed help,) and the test was worth 110%, it was super low stress. The homework was divided into two types, Type 1 which were just problems directly from the textbook (all on Slader) and Type 2. A lot of people didn't enjoy the Type 2 homeworks but I thought it was pretty interesting. There were only about 5 of the Type 2 assignments and half of those required MATLAB. It wasn't anything too hard, just plotting equations and derivatives of equations, I had zero MATLAB knowledge but using YouTube it wasn't even that bad. There was one MATLAB problem which no one really knew how to do, but when it comes down to it that problem was worth at most 0.5% of your grade so there was no point stressing about it. The majority of the Type 2 homework problems was just reading an article or watching a YouTube video and writing down interesting things. The final was only one problem and we had a week to do it, but it was essentially using everything we learned to talk through how one would plot the landing of a Falcon 9 booster. Personally I though this was sick and an awesome way to test our knowledge, but a lot of people didn't like it. Professor Davoyan seemed like a cool dude to me but didn't have the best social cues so I guess might have come across as rude. Honestly I would recommend this class cause I thought it was a refreshing approach on engineering classes that emphasized being independent and developing engineering skills on your own. TL;DR: I wouldn't take this class if you prefer a typical class experience where you just need equations to get by, but if you want to be more independent and develop real engineering thinking, would highly recommend.
AD
Most Helpful Review
He is nice and has a sense of humor, so that's a positive. It's really not worth it to attend his lectures. He goes on and on and it takes an hour for him to explain a single problem. 102 is a really difficult course because of the subject matter and it doesn't help when the professor can't explain the problems effectively. If you can, take 102 with another professor.
He is nice and has a sense of humor, so that's a positive. It's really not worth it to attend his lectures. He goes on and on and it takes an hour for him to explain a single problem. 102 is a really difficult course because of the subject matter and it doesn't help when the professor can't explain the problems effectively. If you can, take 102 with another professor.
Most Helpful Review
FOR 101/102 Klug is a good prof who takes the time during lecture to explain himself clearly and do good ex probs. He assigns way too much hw, but if you make the effort to go to office hrs, he'll work out entire probs with you. He really cares a lot about your understanding and isn't set out to fail anyone. He sometimes does extra credit and his exams are typically a lot like the hw/quizzes. You must submit work for EVERY hw prob to pass the class, though he post soluts you can copy later if you don't get it.
FOR 101/102 Klug is a good prof who takes the time during lecture to explain himself clearly and do good ex probs. He assigns way too much hw, but if you make the effort to go to office hrs, he'll work out entire probs with you. He really cares a lot about your understanding and isn't set out to fail anyone. He sometimes does extra credit and his exams are typically a lot like the hw/quizzes. You must submit work for EVERY hw prob to pass the class, though he post soluts you can copy later if you don't get it.
AD
Most Helpful Review
Fall 2020 - Her lectures were derivation heavy, so I ended up not watching them and just using the equations that she spent the lecture deriving on the homework/tests. The clicker questions aren't reason enough to watch the lecture if you're not paying attention to them, they are a very minor grade boost (less than half a percent). You are required to attend the first 20 minutes of discussion to take a weekly quiz, and those end up being a large part of your final grade, but they are pretty simple. You can leave the discussion after that, but discussion is probably a bit more useful since the TA will just be doing example problems. There is weekly homework that has pretty complex problems (much harder compared to tests/quizzes), and if you are able to figure those out (which is doable if you give it a few hours of thought, just start them early and try to work out the path to the answer, if you get stuck then wait a day and look again, don't look up the answers), then the quizzes and tests will be insanely easy compared to those. The midterm and final were just like a normal midterm and final, all in a Zoom call with the professor. They had the same level of difficulty as the quizzes (aka much easier than the homework).
Fall 2020 - Her lectures were derivation heavy, so I ended up not watching them and just using the equations that she spent the lecture deriving on the homework/tests. The clicker questions aren't reason enough to watch the lecture if you're not paying attention to them, they are a very minor grade boost (less than half a percent). You are required to attend the first 20 minutes of discussion to take a weekly quiz, and those end up being a large part of your final grade, but they are pretty simple. You can leave the discussion after that, but discussion is probably a bit more useful since the TA will just be doing example problems. There is weekly homework that has pretty complex problems (much harder compared to tests/quizzes), and if you are able to figure those out (which is doable if you give it a few hours of thought, just start them early and try to work out the path to the answer, if you get stuck then wait a day and look again, don't look up the answers), then the quizzes and tests will be insanely easy compared to those. The midterm and final were just like a normal midterm and final, all in a Zoom call with the professor. They had the same level of difficulty as the quizzes (aka much easier than the homework).
1 of 1
