Design + Innovation Labs

Fostering hands-on, interdisciplinary design

Who We Are

We are a community of designers and builders within the College of Engineering’s ecosystem of fabrication facilities at UW-Madison. These facilities include the Makerspace (rapid prototyping), TEAM-Lab (Technical Education and Manufacturing Lab – precision machining, fee for service job-shop), the Kohler Innovation Visualization Studio (virtual & augmented reality, 3D scanning, and data visualization), Composites + Automotive Labs, and Student Orgs. These fabrication facilities combined are over 40,000 ft2, run by 10 professional full-time staff members and ~60 student workers. Each space contains millions of dollars of high-tech equipment. Students can build anything here – from micro to macro and from virtual to the physical.

Makerspace

The Makerspace facilities include 25,000 ft2 of shop and flex space with a wide range of rapid prototyping equipment, made possible by the $22 million donation from the Grainger Foundation. Largely student run, the Makerspace strives to empower students by creating a community immersed in emerging technologies, focused on creating innovative products.

The Makerspace website is here.

TEAM-Lab

The College of Engineering Technical Education and Manufacturing Lab (TEAM Lab) is a 14,000 ft2 facility located in the Engineering Centers Building on the University of Wisconsin campus. The TEAM Lab provides University of Wisconsin engineering faculty, staff, and students with the majority of the tools and equipment found in a modern machine shop. The lab is equipped with both manual and CNC mills and lathes, drill presses, grinders, belt sanders, band saws, and additional equipment used in various educational training/manufacturing operations. The lab also houses a full wood lab, welding lab and sheet metal lab. A staff comprised of both professional instrument makers and trained students are available to assist and educate engineering students engaged in work in the space. These resources are used to support the instructional and research goals of the University of Wisconsin’s College of Engineering.

TEAM-Lab’s website is here.

Kohler Visualization Studio

The Kohler Visualization Studio on the first floor of the Makerspace, is a collaborative space for teaching and learning while utilizing a wall sized touch screen, VR headsets, and group workstations.

Included, is development equipment for students to create AR/VR experiences or other projects that require graphics intensive processing.

The Makerspace website is here.

Phil Myers Automotive Center

Phil Myers Automotive Center “PMAC”, is a lab dedicated to the student org car teams on CoE’s campus, and is the home for the following Student Orgs:

Composites Lab

The Composites Lab enables students to post-process their cured composites projects safely and effectively. The lab is located in the Engineering Centers Building (ECB) Room 1063C, inside of the Phil Myers Automotive Center, “PMAC” (shown left).

PMAC is a lab dedicated to the student org car teams on CoE’s campus, and houses advanced automotive equipment in a huge professional workshop.

The Composites Lab website is here.

new composites lab space

Other Student Org Shops

D+I actively manages other shop spaces used by the following Student Orgs:

Other Student Orgs that actively use the D+I labs and resources are:

All College of Engineering Student Orgs are listed here.

See our Student Org Page here.

At right, Arjun Chaudhary describes the rail-braking system of Badgerloop Pod II as the team reveals their group's in-progress design during an event held for media, sponsors and supporters at the Mechanical Engineering Building lobby at the University of Wisconsin-Madison on June 17, 2017. The Badgerloop team is preparing for the international SpaceX Hyperloop Competition II Aug. 25-27, 2017, in California. A hyperloop involves a pod moving in a low-pressure tube at hundreds of miles per hour. The sole criteria for this year's competition is speed. (Photo by Jeff Miller / UW-Madison)