Physics based virtual machines

In 1998 the Department of Mechanical Engineering at San Diego State University began developing a series of courses using virtual reality as a tool to integrate the concepts of mechanical engineering. As the seminal project of these four classes, students are required to select a machine from the world around them and reproduce it in 3D virtual reality. Each of these machines has an inherent physical law that governs an aspect of its function, and students are expected to write the software governing the simplified physics. This paper discusses various aspects of the four courses, but focuses on the last one