Name of company	Leslie Consulting
Contact	David Andrews, Senior Engineer
Address	Goodna Technology Park, 225 Brisbane Terrace, Goodna
Nature of business	Leslie Consulting are professional consulting mechanical engineers operating from a head office in Brisbane. The company was established in 1989 and has averaged over 30% growth in annual revenue for the past 5 years. They provide professional consulting advice and solutions in mechanical engineering, mechanical design, drafting, manufacturing, finite element analysis for stress and strain, data logging and analysis, software development, machine health, condition monitoring, structural vibration of machines, buildings, and civil structures, vibration and modal analysis, and alternative energy systems. Their business principles are characterised by developing long term relationships with customers to provide direct, professional and independent engineering assessments, design and analysis. Leslie Consulting has satellite offices in Dalby and Johannesburg and operates under the guidelines set out by Engineers Australia.
Disciplines required	Mechanical Engineering or Mechanical/Aerospace
No of vacancies	1
Project area/s	In any mining application, wear is a fact of life.   In certain situations, such as those found in the Pilbara region in WA, the wear rates on parts can be so high that they need to be  replaced on a daily basis. Not only does this result in high replacement costs, but also a loss of productive time during the part changeover.   Tooth tips used on large mining excavators are an example of a part which has these characteristics. When a tooth tip wears it tends to blunt, and the perception in the industry is that this reduces the penetration of the bucket, along with its productivity and efficiency. We want to improve the tooth tip design to reduce the rate at which it wears and maintain the penetration of the resulting profile using creative and imaginative techniques.   To help achieve this we need to build reliable models of how the equipment will wear and use these models to test alternate designs. Discrete element modelling (DEM) is ideal for these applications and has developed in leaps and bounds as computer speeds constantly improve. We want to use this tool to develop models of how a part is predicted to wear and then make design changes to improve its worn profile.   We are looking for a student to complete this work in entirety with help and guidance from experienced Leslie Consulting engineers.
Starting date	7 December 2009 for vacation work followed by  PEPS semester one 2010
Selection details	Apply using the PEPS Application from this website. Closing date for applications, Tuesday 6 October 2009. Interviews scheduled for 9 October 2009.
For more information	Visit  Leslie Consulting website or email s.doel@uq.edu.au