CONCEPTUAL MODEL
Problem
Your civilization experienced a total collapse. Your town has started to rebuild and establish order. Oil burning generators have been used to create electricity, however the available oil is scarce. In order to elevate rolling blackouts, your group has been tasked with harnessing the power of the wind to generate electricity. Your town plans to create an entire wind farm based on your wind turbine design. Create a design that is the most efficient you can make it.
Ideas
*We ruled out any idea of a horizontal design as we felt it was less effecient
- Create a base using three soda cans that will hold up the generator
- Create a tower base that stacks straight up leaving the generator positioned to the center of the fan
-Create a big pin wheel paper design
-Create a small pinwheel paper design
-Create a pinwheel using different materials : Plastic, Aluminum, Graph Paper
Constraints
-Recycled Material
-Distance
-Fan Speed
-Safety
-Time
-Has to fit in the box
-The turbine must generate energy
Criteria
-Amount of Power Generated
-Lightweight
-economic(lees material)
-Aesthetically Appealing
-Simple(Little Parts or Sections)
-Effective(How much electricity)
Research
Theoretical Research
All of my research has been done on the internet using virtual resources and provided a great basis for my turbines design. I researched how windmills worked and found that they work best by catching the wind with a curved blade design. That is made out of a very strong material, but is hollow allowing the blades to turn faster. Also a sketch of a wind turbine allowed me to see that the generator turning mechanical energy into electricty was right next to the blades for the most efficiency.
google>how windmills work
google>wind turbines science
Links:
http://learn.kidwind.org/learn/wind_turbine_variables_design
http://energy.gov/eere/wind/how-do-wind-turbines-work
Empirical Research
Testing has proved and denied many theories we have created allowing us to further advance the design of our turbine. Trial and error has allowed us to learn ideal recycled material for a turbines blade. It allowed us to test out different shaft lengths and develop the ideal height and angle for the turbine to catch the greatest "wind".
Idea Matrix
Problem
Your civilization experienced a total collapse. Your town has started to rebuild and establish order. Oil burning generators have been used to create electricity, however the available oil is scarce. In order to elevate rolling blackouts, your group has been tasked with harnessing the power of the wind to generate electricity. Your town plans to create an entire wind farm based on your wind turbine design. Create a design that is the most efficient you can make it.
Ideas
*We ruled out any idea of a horizontal design as we felt it was less effecient
- Create a base using three soda cans that will hold up the generator
- Create a tower base that stacks straight up leaving the generator positioned to the center of the fan
-Create a big pin wheel paper design
-Create a small pinwheel paper design
-Create a pinwheel using different materials : Plastic, Aluminum, Graph Paper
Constraints
-Recycled Material
-Distance
-Fan Speed
-Safety
-Time
-Has to fit in the box
-The turbine must generate energy
Criteria
-Amount of Power Generated
-Lightweight
-economic(lees material)
-Aesthetically Appealing
-Simple(Little Parts or Sections)
-Effective(How much electricity)
Research
Theoretical Research
All of my research has been done on the internet using virtual resources and provided a great basis for my turbines design. I researched how windmills worked and found that they work best by catching the wind with a curved blade design. That is made out of a very strong material, but is hollow allowing the blades to turn faster. Also a sketch of a wind turbine allowed me to see that the generator turning mechanical energy into electricty was right next to the blades for the most efficiency.
google>how windmills work
google>wind turbines science
Links:
http://learn.kidwind.org/learn/wind_turbine_variables_design
http://energy.gov/eere/wind/how-do-wind-turbines-work
Empirical Research
Testing has proved and denied many theories we have created allowing us to further advance the design of our turbine. Trial and error has allowed us to learn ideal recycled material for a turbines blade. It allowed us to test out different shaft lengths and develop the ideal height and angle for the turbine to catch the greatest "wind".
Idea Matrix
Summary
We have concluded that the small blade turbine design is the best winning with a 5 point lead clearly being better than the larger blade turbine design. This was because of many factors such as it generated more electricity, aesthetically looked better because it wasn't so abrupt. Other factors were it taking less material which being 4"x4" opposed to 7"x7" it would be.The smaller design also was simple to make, took up less , and looked simple at the same time all of this helping to fit to constraints such as fitting in the bin.
GRAPHICAL MODEL
TECHNICAL SKETCH
We have concluded that the small blade turbine design is the best winning with a 5 point lead clearly being better than the larger blade turbine design. This was because of many factors such as it generated more electricity, aesthetically looked better because it wasn't so abrupt. Other factors were it taking less material which being 4"x4" opposed to 7"x7" it would be.The smaller design also was simple to make, took up less , and looked simple at the same time all of this helping to fit to constraints such as fitting in the bin.
GRAPHICAL MODEL
TECHNICAL SKETCH
MATHEMATICAL MODEL
Analyze
Data shows many things and in this case it is able to tell us that the number of blades may directly affect the amount of electricity generated. Data shows that the more blades a design had the more electricity it produced. Another trend in the data was that turbines that weighed between 0 to 20 grams actually performed better than those at higher weights in producing electricity. One other trend I saw in the data was that turbines placed at distance one produced more electricity than at other distances.
Adjust
These trends allowed us as a group understand that we were actually at the ideal design dimensions and effectiveness that we did not have to change anything on our design based off these statistics. However, testing and research did lead us to make a couple tweaks here and there. We already had placed our design at marker 1, have 3 blades, and was in the ideal weight range.
Find trends
Analyze
Data shows many things and in this case it is able to tell us that the number of blades may directly affect the amount of electricity generated. Data shows that the more blades a design had the more electricity it produced. Another trend in the data was that turbines that weighed between 0 to 20 grams actually performed better than those at higher weights in producing electricity. One other trend I saw in the data was that turbines placed at distance one produced more electricity than at other distances.
Adjust
These trends allowed us as a group understand that we were actually at the ideal design dimensions and effectiveness that we did not have to change anything on our design based off these statistics. However, testing and research did lead us to make a couple tweaks here and there. We already had placed our design at marker 1, have 3 blades, and was in the ideal weight range.
Find trends
WORKING MODEL
Test and Adjust
There were a lot of changes made throughout this project. We first started off with a three soda can base that held up a cardboard tower that held our generator. This generator was originally turned by a cardboard propeller seen below. We then changed the base of the tower to two soda cans held down by weights on a slip of cardboard. Soon we found the propeller we used to not be efficient and changed it to a paper design which soon turned to plastic. We would also cut down the shaft size to complete our final product seen below.
Pictures
Test and Adjust
There were a lot of changes made throughout this project. We first started off with a three soda can base that held up a cardboard tower that held our generator. This generator was originally turned by a cardboard propeller seen below. We then changed the base of the tower to two soda cans held down by weights on a slip of cardboard. Soon we found the propeller we used to not be efficient and changed it to a paper design which soon turned to plastic. We would also cut down the shaft size to complete our final product seen below.
Pictures
Redesign/Revisions
Overall I feel me and my partner did a great job with our design , but left a lot of areas to improve. First is to make a design that doesn't involve a shaft to be attached to the propeller. Trial and error showed us that the longer the shaft the less power our design generated allowing us to conclude no shaft is the way to go. The last area i feel needs improvement is the materiel used for the propeller, though paper and plastic did a good job I think experimenting with other materials would have had us doing something different.
Overall I feel me and my partner did a great job with our design , but left a lot of areas to improve. First is to make a design that doesn't involve a shaft to be attached to the propeller. Trial and error showed us that the longer the shaft the less power our design generated allowing us to conclude no shaft is the way to go. The last area i feel needs improvement is the materiel used for the propeller, though paper and plastic did a good job I think experimenting with other materials would have had us doing something different.