Design Documentation
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.
Generate Ideas
Idea 1:
-Foam bowl base with hole in the bottom to hold motor
-Mini plastic bottle cut in half and glued together backwards
-Mini plastic bottle is attached to straw that is hot glued to motor shaft
Idea 2:
-Balsa wood base holding up motor
-Attached to the motor is paper blades held together by balsa wood
-Paper blades have balsa wood skeletons to make them more sturdy
Idea 3:
-Pinwheel created with paper is hot glued to the motor
-Motor with pinwheel attached is glued to cardboard
-Cardboard glued onto 2 soda cans stacked on top of each other with the bottom soda can filled with water
Constraints
-Can only use recycled materials, 3 sticks of balsa wood, and hot glue
-Wind turbine must fit in bin provided for storage
-Must stand by itself
-Can only use one motor to generate electricity
Criteria
-How efficient is the wind turbine?
-How much electricity does the wind turbine generate?
-How much does the wind turbine weigh?
-How big is the wind turbine?
-How simple is the design of the wind turbine?
Research
How does a wind turbine work?
-They use wind in order to create electricity, wind turns blades that turn a shaft that is connected to a generator
What are the types of wind turbines?
-Horizontal-axis turbines, usually have 3 long blades and are most common
-Vertical-axis turbines, have an egg beater like shape, are not very common
http://energy.gov/eere/wind/how-do-wind-turbines-work
Idea 1 Test (Fail): Stand needs to be sturdy and heavy in order to keep wind turbine from falling, blades need to be curved in order to catch wind properly.
Idea 2 Test(Fail): The blades did not catch any wind and were almost too sturdy due to the balsa wood skeleton causing the motor to create no energy, however the base held up the structure very well;
Idea 3 Test (Success): Wind turbine got up to 0.4 and the closer the wind turbine is to the fan the better for energy creation.
Possible Solutions
Idea 1: Create a wind turbine using a foam bowl as a base that has a hole in the bottom for the motor, the motor acts as the weight holding the foam bowl down. The bowl has a balsa stick coming from the top of it that is attached to the motor shaft. The balsa wood is attached to a 2 blades created out of mini, plastic water bottles cut in half. Whenever the bottles catch wind they will spin causing the balsa wood to spin, since the balsa wood is attached to the motor shaft whenever it spins the motor does as well.
Idea 2: Create a wind turbine using 2 soda cans stacked on top of each other and hot glued as a base. The bottom can will be filled with water to act as the weight. The top can has a flat, square piece of cardboard laying on it that the motor is glued onto the edge of. The motor shaft has a paper pinwheel create from origami hot glued to it. Whenever the pin wheel spins it will spin the motor shaft since it is hot glued onto the motor shaft.
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.
Generate Ideas
Idea 1:
-Foam bowl base with hole in the bottom to hold motor
-Mini plastic bottle cut in half and glued together backwards
-Mini plastic bottle is attached to straw that is hot glued to motor shaft
Idea 2:
-Balsa wood base holding up motor
-Attached to the motor is paper blades held together by balsa wood
-Paper blades have balsa wood skeletons to make them more sturdy
Idea 3:
-Pinwheel created with paper is hot glued to the motor
-Motor with pinwheel attached is glued to cardboard
-Cardboard glued onto 2 soda cans stacked on top of each other with the bottom soda can filled with water
Constraints
-Can only use recycled materials, 3 sticks of balsa wood, and hot glue
-Wind turbine must fit in bin provided for storage
-Must stand by itself
-Can only use one motor to generate electricity
Criteria
-How efficient is the wind turbine?
-How much electricity does the wind turbine generate?
-How much does the wind turbine weigh?
-How big is the wind turbine?
-How simple is the design of the wind turbine?
Research
How does a wind turbine work?
-They use wind in order to create electricity, wind turns blades that turn a shaft that is connected to a generator
What are the types of wind turbines?
-Horizontal-axis turbines, usually have 3 long blades and are most common
-Vertical-axis turbines, have an egg beater like shape, are not very common
http://energy.gov/eere/wind/how-do-wind-turbines-work
Idea 1 Test (Fail): Stand needs to be sturdy and heavy in order to keep wind turbine from falling, blades need to be curved in order to catch wind properly.
Idea 2 Test(Fail): The blades did not catch any wind and were almost too sturdy due to the balsa wood skeleton causing the motor to create no energy, however the base held up the structure very well;
Idea 3 Test (Success): Wind turbine got up to 0.4 and the closer the wind turbine is to the fan the better for energy creation.
Possible Solutions
Idea 1: Create a wind turbine using a foam bowl as a base that has a hole in the bottom for the motor, the motor acts as the weight holding the foam bowl down. The bowl has a balsa stick coming from the top of it that is attached to the motor shaft. The balsa wood is attached to a 2 blades created out of mini, plastic water bottles cut in half. Whenever the bottles catch wind they will spin causing the balsa wood to spin, since the balsa wood is attached to the motor shaft whenever it spins the motor does as well.
Idea 2: Create a wind turbine using 2 soda cans stacked on top of each other and hot glued as a base. The bottom can will be filled with water to act as the weight. The top can has a flat, square piece of cardboard laying on it that the motor is glued onto the edge of. The motor shaft has a paper pinwheel create from origami hot glued to it. Whenever the pin wheel spins it will spin the motor shaft since it is hot glued onto the motor shaft.
Mathematical Model
After analyzing the data our group concluded that there is a correlation between height and electricity generated. By using the chart listed below we found that the taller the wind turbine the more power it generated. Due to this we decided that our wind turbine would be better with tall blades and also concluded that the current design with 2 soda cans stacked on top of each other would work well.
After analyzing the data our group concluded that there is a correlation between height and electricity generated. By using the chart listed below we found that the taller the wind turbine the more power it generated. Due to this we decided that our wind turbine would be better with tall blades and also concluded that the current design with 2 soda cans stacked on top of each other would work well.
Working Model
Summary
We ended up choosing the soda can with paper pinwheel solution for various reasons. We went with this idea as it is the most efficient out of all of our designs, lightweight, uses the least amount of recycled materials, and generates the most amount of electricity out of all of our ideas with 0.501 energy. We also went with this idea as it is the easiest to replicate just in case we need to make any adjustments or re-create it. We also chose this idea as the foam bowl with mini bottle blades idea was too flimsy even with modifications to the base and was not efficient as we had to hold it up a lot of the times and it did not create a lot of electricity at 0.021 energy created.
Revisions
We made many revisions to our wind turbine design as we created it. On the first day we used only flimsy paper for the pinwheel and instead of spinning the pinwheel was pushed back, so then we tried thick computer paper but we were only getting 0.204 energy creation. The next day in order to solve this problem we decided to create the pin wheel using 2 layers of paper to make it sturdier this caused a double in energy that caused us to create 0.463 energy. We then decided to add weight to our base by detaching the soda cans, filling the bottom soda can with water, and re-gluing them. This caused us to create even more energy and boosted our energy creation up to 0.504. After this we weren't able to find any more revisions that we could make in order to boost our energy production.
We made many revisions to our wind turbine design as we created it. On the first day we used only flimsy paper for the pinwheel and instead of spinning the pinwheel was pushed back, so then we tried thick computer paper but we were only getting 0.204 energy creation. The next day in order to solve this problem we decided to create the pin wheel using 2 layers of paper to make it sturdier this caused a double in energy that caused us to create 0.463 energy. We then decided to add weight to our base by detaching the soda cans, filling the bottom soda can with water, and re-gluing them. This caused us to create even more energy and boosted our energy creation up to 0.504. After this we weren't able to find any more revisions that we could make in order to boost our energy production.