Hello! I am taking calculus 3 online during a maymester at my community college and I was wondering if I should transfer it or take it again at my home university . When I registered for classes my teacher spot was a TBD and I chose to take it initially with the plan that if I got stuck with a horrible teacher I would take the credit so I could move to Diff Equ. But now I’m starting to get discouraged the more I walk though this course content . (especially with binomial vectors- i don’t fully understand when I will ever apply this and it makes it harder to wrap my head around it)
Now I only just realized how I may have a weaker calc 3 foundation by taking this class as a maymester, online, not at my home university. Do you think I should retake calc 3 ? My school doesn’t post the exams for calc 3 or Diff Equ online so I don’t have a means of testing how good I am or am not at the material.
WHat are examples of how crucial calc 3 is in mechanical engineering? Times I would need to know it ?
and while I’m at it, when will I ever apply Calc 2 ? (Like solid disks of revolution)
Thank you in advance !
Vector calculus is ubiquitous in some mechanical engineering subjects such as fluid mechanics or dynamics. Surface and volume integrals, divergence, curl, gradients, and the rest are all going to pop up again.
As for calculus 2, I fear if your takeaway from that course is bodies of revolution, you’ve missed the point. Bodies of revolution work because you are adding up infinitely many infinitesimally thin disks whose radii follow the function in question. It’s the adding of tiny parts that is the important process, and it’s going to show up everywhere. Also, make sure you brush up on your Taylor series. Those are also quite common.
@boneh3ad
I see ; I guess their is no harm in retaking it then; it doesn’t speed up or slow down my graduation time . or anything. Which classes will calc to play a strong role in ?
I’m sorry, its because I can see the value in things like integrating by parts and trig sub at face value and the potential use of arc length and polar coordinates but I didn’t realize taylor series were a source I should brush up on ( I guess I though it was just a less precise alternative to actual integration) Any other parts of calc two you suggest I review besides taylor, Mac and power series?
You are an engineering student. Calculus will play a role in every single technical class you take from here on out. It’s a prerequisite for all of them for a reason.
I’m a soph mechanical engineering student taking vector calc right now. The content of calc 3 is a lot to get through but it is the foundation for vector calc which is used quite a bit in physics and dynamics, and some in statics and materials. In some ways, I wish I had taken the entire calc series before touching physics or engineering. You don’t need to know calc 3 to do it but it does make a lot more sense…
One way to get a better look at the future courses is to check out the books used at some schools you are applying to, take a look at the problems and math you will be using. In addition to what’s already been mentioned, make sure to be confident with trig sub and trig identities, it’s handy for polar/spherical/challenging problems.
A lot of times you may not directly use Calc 3 but concepts will show up time and time again. It will be assumed in your later classes that you can whip out and solve problems that may use vector Calc at any point. For instance in a class doing magnetic fields the prof won’t show you how to solve double integrals, it is assumed you know.