About me

Hi! My name is Ethan, I am a 4th-year Mechanical Engineering student at Nottingham Trent University. I was born in the United States and moved to Doncaster where I grew up until I moved to Coventry for 6th form. Please check out a selection of my interests and my leisure time activities below.

My aviation journey...

My aviation journey started in 2004 when my father would take me to the mountain overlooking Sangster International Airport in Jamaica to watch the planes take off and land. This obsession changed from watching planes to flying planes when my father bought me Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004. I played this game to the point that whenever I got on a plane, I believed that if it came to it, I could land the plane for the pilots because of course I know where the buttons are (I doubt that now in hindsight).

Although I have had a career goal shift, aviation is still finding its way into my life decisions. The video of me in a Cessna is my first PPL (private pilot licence) trail flight in Nottingham, which was everything I was preparing for. My next step in aviation is creating a VR motion rig system where I can fly wherever I can from the comfort of my own home and more importantly, cheaper. Project progress can be viewed in the projects section under 'motion rig project.

FDM/SLA 3D Printing

In December 2020 I had the idea to buy a 3d printer because of a review video I stumbled across online. I choose the entry-level Ender 3 printer which is still in use today. I feel this purchase was the most crucial piece of kit to my engineering career since Due to COVID-19, the first two years of the engineering course were online. This meant I never physically touched or even created anything two years into my academic career. Once I assembled the printer and printed my first part from fusion 360 (a ketchup holder I made for my car) a new passion was created.

The steep learning curve involved understanding the importance of tolerances, choice of materials and price trade-offs, and time required for printing parts. As of now, I still have my Ender 3 printer which I use for projects however I now have the addition of an SLS resin printer, the elagoo mars2, which I am integrating into my projects with designs such as the '3D printed hand' image on the home page.

My interests in electronics...

Funnily enough, my interest in electronics was entirely accidental. During the second year of University, we were told to purchase an Arduino starter kit for a module that includes enough sensors and electrical components to build most projects beginners can dream of. Once I purchased the kit I realised down the line that the kit would not be helpful for the coursework, as a consequence, I now owned an Arduino kit.

Being curious, I watched a few YouTube videos on how to work the microcontroller with the goal of creating a door alarm for my room. Immediately after successfully making the alarm, I knew that electronics & software development were a passion of mine I would need to carry with me into my future endeavours like my motion rig project.