FLC | ARL-sponsored, student-designed K-9 training tool wows in demo

ARL-sponsored, student-designed K-9 training tool wows in demo

April 28, 2020

A partnership between the Army Research Laboratory and the Campbell University School of Engineering in Buies Creek, North Carolina, has produced and successfully demonstrated a “bleeding” dog-bite sleeve for K-9 training by police and military units.

The team of senior engineering students who developed the device travelled 80 miles to Kinston, NC, earlier this semester to test and demonstrate their prototype bite sleeve with the Kinston Police Department. The team developed a thin, durable bite sleeve that can produce a blood stimulant when bitten into. The goal was to provide a more realistic encounter for K-9 unit dogs during training.

“The problem for training K-9 unit dogs is that current sleeves are very bulky and, if pierced, provide no indication that the assailant might bleed,” said Kim Fowler, associate professor engineering. “When newly-trained dogs do encounter assailants, they tend to release hold quickly because a human arm is different than the bulky, dry training sleeves.”

The project was sponsored by the Army Research Laboratory and led by engineering External Advisory Board members Stephen Lee, senior scientist for the Army Research Office, and Brandon Conover, CEO of Fuquay Varina, NC-based Practical Scientific Solutions, Inc.

The team started development of the dog-bite sleeve back in August. The sleeve performed flawlessly during the demonstration in Kinston. It is thin and light, but still provided excellent protection to the training officer.

The sleeve design was one of the industry-supported hands-on capstone projects for Campbell engineering students taking ENGR 491 and 492. The Senior Design Sequence emulates a professional business environment where students are assigned to projects according to their professional interests and markets that they will pursue. Meeting regularly with industry sponsors, students learn the basics of project management and systems engineering as they demonstrate effective communication and problem-solving through their Conceptual Design Review along with Project Plan, Architecture and Requirements, Analysis, and Test Plans in the first semester.

The students develop their prototypes and present a Preliminary Design Review and a Critical Design Review in the spring, prior to the final document deliverables including design descriptions, test results and user manuals.