What to study to become a mechatronics engineer?

[_ZERO_]

Next year I will finish my IGCSEs (High school), and I want to become a mechatronics engineer.
Is a mechatronic engineering a branch? Or will I start immediately in studying mechatronics at college?

sorry if i sound confusing

 

[jedishrfu]

Welcome to PF!

Mechatronics is a multi-disciplinary engineering degree. You take courses in electronics, mecahincal engineering, programming and systems.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechatronics

There's a lot of good references in the wikipedia article that should keep you busy.

Some info on Mechatronic degrees:

http://educatingengineers.com/degrees/mechatronic-engineering

I imagine if you wanted to get a start on learning more about it, try playing with an Arduino or Raspberry-PI. The arduino has many DIY hardware projects available online. Arduinos are more heavily hardware oriented with programming gluing together the hardware components of your project. The Raspberry-PI is more software oriented where python programs are used to control a limited number of onboard ports and the devices connected to them.

One other option is to checkout the IOIO card which can use an Android device as the computer to control some hardware components attached to the IOIO card.

Both adafruit.com and sparkfun.com sell these cards.

For a more lightweight but pricier approach, there's the little bits electronics at littlebits.cc Little bits are snap together components for mostly hardware projects. They do have a component for cloud based control of a project where you can use a device connected to the internet to control your project.

 

[donpacino]

Next year I will finish my IGCSEs (High school), and I want to become a mechatronics engineer.
Is a mechatronic engineering a branch? Or will I start immediately in studying mechatronics at college?

sorry if i sound confusing

As far as the major you will pick, some schools have a mechatronics major.

If they don't, they might have a mechantronics concentration (usually in the Mech-e department).

If they don't have that, you can choose either mechanical or electrical engineering and then take relevant courses in the other major as electives. There will be programming that you will need, but usually you can take those through the EE department.

I wouldn't recommend doing comp sci as a major if you want to be a mechatronics engineer.

 

[_ZERO_]

Thank you guys!