Chemical engineering undergrad's on-campus locomotive hopes to inspire engineering creativity
Skateboards, bicycles, scooters and roller blades are common sights at Purdue University. Traversing campus in a timely manner requires a pair of wheels — and a little creativity — for the longer treks. Clacking through the engineering mall alongside the skateboards, scooters and roller blades is a motor-powered and accurate-to-scale blue, gold, green and black mini freight train.
The locomotive is the motor-powered passion project of chemical engineering student Ramon Pardo. What started as a quick project to help him find an internship morphed into the thing to see in West Lafayette, much like the morphsuit students. Large, colorful and “slow by skateboard standards,” in Pardo’s words, the train is in no hurry to speed across campus. Much like Pardo is in no hurry to rush through his engineering degree and college experience. The locomotive’s easygoing pace makes it easy to see coming. With luck, Pardo can also be heard coming: his 12-wheeled board passing over bricks sounds just like a train clacking over tracks.
“I didn’t think the train would have the cratering impact that it has here,” Pardo said. “I thought when I first started riding it around campus that people would just kind of look at it weird and then just dismiss it from their minds. I was severely wrong. I would like to argue that Purdue is probably the only place, the only college on planet Earth, that I could ride a freight train to class and get cheered on instead of laughed at.”
The unbridled delight that the train brings to passersby is the fruits of Pardo’s — and two clubs’ — labors. Pardo spent six months designing his train, then six months building it, all while working and studying full-time. By the time it made its first on-campus journey in March 2020, it had fingerprints of the Electric Vehicle Club (EVC) and the Purdue Railroad Club all over it, just as integral as Pardo’s original idea.
“Without the Electric Vehicle Club, this train would not have existed,” Pardo said. He had served as the president of EVC for a short time. “I am, at heart, a ChemE. The electronics and the mechanicals were not really in my major, so through EVC I got a lot of help on structure and function.”
Even amid its pandemic beginning, Pardo was able to find assistance with its numerous breakdowns and troubleshoots. The nearly 200-pound, 6.5-foot long locomotive is a testament to teamwork. Now, as it reaches five years old, the craft is also an homage to the importance of rest in the creative process.
“My biggest problems with the train were problems that I rushed to find solutions for,” Pardo said. “I’d cut corners, and they’d come back to bite me later. Taking a break allows you to basically take a second look at something.”
As a busy engineering student with an equally busy work schedule, Pardo found himself not only cutting corners in his accurate-to-scale freight but in his health. And just as rushing would cause his train extra breakdowns, his shortcuts caused his health to take a steep decline.
He spent one finals week in a hospital. When he began recuperating at home, he revisited his schedule and project in a new light: the two were integrally connected, both impacted by his health and his demanding schedule. Rest was just as important to being a student and an employee as it was to his ongoing locomotive project.
“The train would break down, and I would just let it sit for a while because I was burnt out from trying to fix it. I would come back maybe a month later after basically taking a break from it and have a whole new set of eyes on it, and suddenly the problems were super fixable,” he said.
“The main purpose of a break, in my opinion, is not only the rest, but the reflection.”
The Purdue Railroad Club and EVC provided crucial support to Pardo as he recovered. His friends made intentional time to see him and help him get back on his feet. His on-campus job was adjusted so he could continue to work, even if it was only a few hours each week.
“The college experience is not just the books. It's the people,” he said. "And the train helped me find those people. I am certain of it.”
With part-time classes and time to recover, Pardo found himself regaining creativity and ready to return to his project. His fresh perspective on the importance of rest helped him achieve better grades and fix corners he’d previously cut on his passion project. Now a senior, Pardo finds himself enjoying the inconvenience of his train’s navigation around campus and the hiccups that come with adding to it.
“It's very easy to get caught trying to race through life, but the train isn't special because it's fast. It isn't special because it's big. It's special because it's a train. It's heavy, it's inconvenient, but it's fun.”
He is not the only person enjoying the heavy, inconvenient and fun locomotive. The joy he sees all over campus on his way to class surprises him anew each time.
He hopes that his innovation can inspire others to test their creative limits and embrace the insights rest can give. Pardo also hopes others will enjoy his addition of new rail cars as much as he has enjoyed making them.
“I don't want to be the only train on campus. I think it would be hilarious if there were more of them.”
There may well be more cars, trains or customized skateboards that follow suit, especially from EVC. A friend of Pardo’s created a rideable Space Shuttle; another has begun their own rideable train. And many more hands have joined the effort to perfect the train.
“I'm more than confident that the students at Purdue can create things that they deem equally amazing if they put their minds to it,” Pardo said.
Through EVC and Model Railroad club, he has seen the creativity Purdue engineers have to offer, even in the little projects. He hopes that their creations will grow into the Purdue landscape, making the campus even more memorable location for engineers, past, present and future.
