Announcing Winners of the 2015 Aluminum Extrusion Student Design CompetitionAnnouncing Winners of the 2015 Aluminum Extrusion Student Design Competition

Winners of the annual 2015 Aluminum Extrusion Student Design Competition have been announced by the ET Foundation. Nearly 60 student entries were received from North American schools and universities, and $8,500 in scholarship funds were awarded to the top four designs.

The winning entries came from students in industrial design, engineering, and related fields. They were judged on four basic ET Foundation design competition criteria -- creativity, practicality, process improvement, and market potential. Judges were aluminum extrusion industry professionals, including David Asher, process optimization manager at Bonnell Aluminum; Todd Boyer, director of sales and marketing at Mid-States Aluminum Corp.; and Joseph Benedyk, mechanical, materials & aerospace engineering research professor at the Illinois Institute of Technology. Bonnell Aluminum, a leading manufacturer of custom aluminum extrusions, was the sole sponsor of the scholarship cash awards. This is the first year the company has sponsored the competition.

MORE FROM DESIGN NEWS: Aerospace-Grade Aluminum Gives Structure to Smartphones

The ET Foundation is an educational and technology research organization founded by the Aluminum Extruders Council (AEC). The foundation also runs a professional design competition for aluminum extrusion designs in even-numbered years. You can view this years' winning student entries, as well as winning entries from past student and professional design competitions, on the foundation's website.

Beginning this fall, you can find the call to entries for the 2016 design contest, in both professional and student categories, here. Judging will be finished in time for the winning entries to be displayed at next year's 11th International Aluminum Extrusion Technology Seminar-ET '16, May 2-6, 2016 in Chicago.

Click on the image below to view the winners:

MORE FROM DESIGN NEWS: 5 Ways to Evaluate Aluminum Extrusion for Wider Application

Ann R. Thryft is senior technology editor, materials & assembly, for Design News. She's been writing about manufacturing- and electronics-related technologies for 27 years, covering manufacturing materials & processes, alternative energy, and robotics. In the past, she's also written about machine vision and all kinds of communications.