Instructor

Deepak Marla

Section

S1

Semester

Autumn ‘20

Course Difficulty

Course content itself was not difficult. However there were a lot of topics to be covered which made it tough. The course is divided into around 13 sub topics which basically included different types of manufacturing processes.
Particularly for Prof Marla’s section, the difficulty of the course increases because of quizzes, term paper, group project and assignments. Hence, one has to continuously be in touch with the contents, this is not a course which you can study for 3 days before the exams.

Time Commitment Required

High time commitment required. We had mini quizzes almost every class. However, we gave feedback which was well acknowledged and this component of evaluation might be subject to change.
As mentioned, due to term paper, assignments, and group project this course requires a lot of time commitment.

Grading Policy and Statistics

Poor. 9/166 AAs. However ABs and BBs were high as a consequence.
The silver lining is that there is uniformity in grading throughout sections.

Attendance Policy

Due to online mode of instruction, attendance was not made compulsory.

Pre-requisites

Only prerequisite as per my knowledge would be the relevant core courses i.e., Manufacturing Processes I and Structural Materials.

Evaluation Scheme

10% quizzes
10% assignment
10% term paper
20% group project
50% endsem

Topics Covered in the Course

Spends a lot of time in machining. Moves on to laser processing, additive, electrochemical machining, electric discharge machining, ion beam, abrasive machining, ultrasonic, water jet and finally metrology and electronics manufacturing.

Teaching Style

Prof Marla is a bit strict, but he does acknowledge feedback given to him. Teaching was ok. We had normal online classes in the slots. Lectures were recorded.

Tutorials/Assignments/Projects

The effort does not match the weight-age in this course. You might spend a lot of time for very less weight-age (term paper, project). Assignments were easy. Project was also not extremely intellectually stimulating and marking was generous.
Mini quizzes were the biggest pain. They were also not announced, although we assumed there would be one every class. Due to quizzes, we ended up spending half hour more every class.

Other Remarks

You can ace the course provided you are thorough and regular (and ofc the grading is generous). There was nothing extremely hard, just continuous effort is required.

ME 338 Review By: Arjun Kulshrestha