The progress and development in the fields of technologies in the past few decades are impressive. With so many innovations that have had an impact on human lives and have changed them so drastically, living in a time where new technologies are still making massive changes, and, unquestionably, it wil continue with that trend. As the techniques are continuously evolving, people are forced to prepare ourselves and our descendants to the new and upcoming technologies so that they would be able to understand them, use them, teach others about them and also make some improvements in the specific fields of applications. This article presents an overview of the principal results of research on the impact of Virtual Reality (VR) 3D education for students in industrial vocational training. They were introducedto the generated model and had to explore all elements to have personal experience in the virtual environment. After the training, a user experience survey has been conducted, and the results obtained after the use of the system were presented.

The aim of this paper is to investigate the possibility of drone optimization by selecting and testing the best material suitable for additive manufacturing technology and generative design approach, i. e. shape optimization. The use of additive manufacturing technology enables the creation of models of more complex shapes that are difficult or impossible to produce with conventional processing methods. The complex and unconventional design of the drone body can open up many possibilities for weight reduction while maintaining the strength of the drone body. By using 3D printing in addition to FEM (Finite Element Method) analysis, and generative design it can identify areas of the drone body that are overdrawn, allowing it to either lift off material or simply change the design at these areas. Choosing the right material for this application is crucial in order to optimise the mechanical properties of the material with weight, material cost, printability and availability of the material and the 3D printing method, while at the same time reducing environmental pollution. The goal is to reduce the drone mass by 15–20 % using generative design tools. Mass is an important segment when prototyping a drone. If the drone is too heavy, more lift power is needed to keep the drone in the air, so the propellers have to turn faster and use more energy. Consequently, the reduction of drone mass should increase the take-off weight. In this article 5 commercial drones of similar characteristics are compared with the final proposal of our 3D printed drone (Prototype 1). The rotor distance between the drones, the weight of the electric motor and the take-off weight are compared. The goal was to produce a prototype with a big rotor distance-to-weight ratio, and take-off weight bigger than observed drones have. The defined goal function was optimized in order to evaluate characteristics of 12 different 3D printed materials. Following properties: ultimate strength, stiffness, durability, printability of the material, and required bed and extruder temperature for printing were taken in consideration to select optimal material. Polycarbonate proved to be the best choice for 3D printing UAVs

The most commonly used subsea pipeline installation method is the S-Lay method. A very important and complex task in an S-Lay installation engineering analysis is to find the optimal pipelay vessel installation configuration for every distinctive pipeline route section. Installation loads in the pipeline are very sensitive to small changes in the configuration of the pipeline supports during laying and other influential parameters, such as the tensioner force, stinger angle, trim and draft of the pipelay vessel. Therefore, the process of an engineering installation analysis is very demanding, and there is a need for an automated optimization process. For that purpose, installation engineering methodology criteria and requirements are formalized into a nonlinear optimization problem with mixed continuous and discrete variables. A special tailored multi-objective genetic algorithm is developed that can be adjusted to any desired combination of criteria and offshore standards’ requirements. The optimization algorithm is applied to the representative test cases. The optimization procedure efficiency and quality of the achieved solution prove that the developed genetic algorithm operators and the whole optimization approach are adequate for the presented application.

Mechanical behavior and characteristics of two different types of materials: cast iron with lamellar graphite EN-GJL-250 and cast iron with spheroidal graphite EN-GJS-400-15 which were cast in ceramic molds using gravitational casting method has considered in this research. The ceramic molds were obtained by 3D printing method. First, a finite element analysis was developed to determine Tresca and von Mises stresses and the deformations of the ceramic molds under an applied pressure of 25 MPa. Samples were produced by gravitational casting using two types of cast iron materials. Mechanical tests were made using samples produced from these two types of materials and microstructure analysis evaluation of fractured zones was realized by scanning electron microscopy. Obtained results were finally used for designing, developing, and producing of one ‘hydraulic block’ of a railway installation by the Benninger Guss company of Switzerland.

The paper presents some essential tools in the field of 3D modelling for vocational education. The purpose of vocational training is to adequately prepare students for the needs of the industry. Over the last decade, the appearance of low-cost virtual reality (VR) technology has enabled it to be deployed across a broad range of educational institutions. VR as a system allows intuitive human-computer interaction and offers great benefits in many application areas important for educational process. In this paper, two VR studies in educational field were compared.