Project Description: In this project, we learned how to design and build a small house that would stay at a comforable tempature and light throughout the day. We did a series of labs all leading up to designing a reflector for last years stem solar studio, designing a coldframe and possibly creating a bonus plan.
Project Outline:
1. Atomic structure, state and heat -By reading through our textbook and Mr. Williams favorite book, a short history of nearly everything, we learned more about atoms and heat transfer. With this knowlege, we could better design and understand heat and insulation.
2. Design a solar water heater - We had to design a mini water heater power only by the sun. Our group's design feature a milk carton that directed water by a copper tube through a aluminium foil ceral box. The box is placed at an angle in order to get the maximum amount of sunlight and the box has a magnifyng sheet to magnify the suns ray's onto a single point and also to trap the heat in the box. After storing the water inside the pipe for a few seconds, the pipe is unplugged and water is drained into a cup which is poured back into the milk carton. The carton is covered in insulating material to keep the heat from escaping. After twenty minitues, we tested the tempature of the water and found it had gone up about ten degrees. This was one of the more effective designs but done of the designs came close to the winner which increased the tempature by over thirty degrees.
Picture of design:
Problems With design:
There were many problems with our design. When we used the magnifying sheet, we did not fully understand how a magnifying glass works. We did not realize it would just focus the light on a single point, a point where we did not have any water. The construction was not great, the foil became crumpled and the pipe was bent poorly. We did not having anything to make a seal between the pipe and the cartoon leading to about half our water being dripped out. We also did not calculate the correct angle to place the heater at for maximime direct sunlight. Instead, we just placed peices of scrap wood under estimate the correct angle. Other than that, our design was pretty good an dwould have been much more effective if we had time to revise it.
3. Daylighting design activity: - In this project, we designed and built a model home to test daylighting techniques. The three main techniques we focoused on where lighttubes, lightshelves and clerestory windows.
Our design:
As you can see, our design features mainly light shelves, light tubes and sky lights. Right away, we relized how little we knew about house design. We were trying to build a mansion with an office, four bedrooms and four bathrooms, a kitchen, living room, dining room, family room and more. After our first blueprint was had two foot by two foot bathroom and a bedroom that could not fit a bed. We decied to cut back on most of the rooms, leaving only the necessities. Still, rooms where placed in akward places mkaing them long a narrow with some rooms trapped directily in the middle of the house. We focused too much on fancy daylighting techniques, leaving out importaint things like windows and skylights. This caused us to make last minitue modifications to the model during testing. Testing of our models was inacurate because we used flashlights to test lighting and many of out elements can only work large scale (ie. our light tubes were rolled up peices of tin foil making them useless while real light tube are actually very effective). Also, since the walls were made of cardboard, they did not reflect light like regular walls. Overall we had good ideas but clearly had know idea how to build a house.
5. Site selection: -The next part of the project was site selection. A big part of designing a house is where to put it on a peice of property. With the entire school property avalible, there was alot to choose from. The perfect property had to be quiet, have lots of sunlight, flat ground to put a stable foundation, private, atractive, and not being used. While the football field would have been ideal, it was already in use. We went all around campus with team member Aidan following close behind on crutches, going up many flights of stairs, up and down hills and through unkept fields before decieding on three locations. After indivually rating each spot, we decieded on the top baseball field. It was quiet, got lots of sun, had a great view, completly flat for a strong foundation, very private, and had lots of extra room for a small building. Unfortunatly, since last years class had already built a house, we would have no building to place on our site.
6. Materials testing -Another importiant part of building somthing is to use the best materials for each situation. In this lab, we collected many diffrent materials we thought we might use for diffrent purposes. We had insulators, paints and other materials, each with their own test to see which material was most effictive in each catagory. Each group got a catagory to test and then the classes results were recorded on the board for everyone to see. Our group got insulators. We made boxes out of each insulator and placed a hot dog inside and recorded how much heat was lost every two minutes. The material that made its hot dog lose the least heat was the most effictive. Out of all of the materials, we found that the most efficitive were felt and reflective bubble wrap. Unfortuanatly, the test was not completely acurate due to many errors. First of, some of the materials were not used right. For example, we used spray foam but, we to already sprayed chunks of foam and threw it in a box, making it much less effective. Also, the boxes for the insulaters were made poorly and inconsistently and the hot dogs were taken out, letting them cool.
7. Building Design -This was the biggest part of the project in which we designed two to three designs to be judged and some ultimately built. The things we had to design were a coldframe, a reflector for the previous year's solar studio and possibily a bonus plan that we created.
Cold Frame: A coldframe is basicly a mini greenhouse that you put a plant or two into. The graden club wanted one so rather than buy one, we were tasked in designing one and the top three would be built. Our design had a 2x2 frame covered in plywood. It had a black outside to absorb as much heat and a white inside to reflect the light onto the plants without burning them. At the top was a watering hole to water the plants. The front was placed at a 62 degree angle to get direct sunlight during the winter. It had a lip at the buttom to hold an old window that we were given to use. The window would help to trap the heat as well as let in light. The removable design allowed for plants to be cared for as well as the initial instilation of the plant into the coldframe. Some flaws in the design were the front panel. The glass was not anchored down, leading to possible breakage. Also, the watering hole had never been designed a cover which would let in unwanted things into the coldframe. Overall it was a solid design that could have used a little tweaking.
Slideshow:
Reflector: The 13-14 stem kids had designed and built a solar studio that used no electricity. The only thing wrong with the studio is that it has a north window, which is getting very little light in. The group who designed the studio also designed a reflector for the north window which directs light into the window. Unfortunatly, the reflector was left out and stolen and the window continues to be useless. Now, our class had to design a new, better reflector to be presented to a group of judges and possibly chosed to be built. Our design was two 18in by 6ft aluminuim reflectors positioned to reflect light directly to the window. The first reflector is attached to the top of the studio at a 62 degree angle to direct light stright downwards right to the second reflector, postitioned under the window at a 90 degree angle to shoot light into the window. Both reflectors are made up of 3ft by 3ft aluminum sheets cut in half and lain side by side lengthwise. Then, they are attched to a 18in by 6ft peice of plywood to keep in stiff. Next, the top reflector in anchored onto the building by attaching two 2ft 2x4s on the roof, six feet apart with one foot on the roof, one hanging off. The end hanging off the roof is cut at a 67.5 degree angle and the reflector is placed on top, in the middle, shiny side down. The bottom reflector is attached by driling two 2x4s under the window with two L-brackets per 2x4. They are angled at a 90 degree angle then the reflector is drilled on. Now two two foot 2x4s are cut at both ends at 90 degrees and attached under the reflector.
Slideshow
Bonus Project: Our group decied to do a bonus project. We came up with the idea while working on the coldframe design in the solar studio on a rainy day. The studio is like five feet from the road, meaning you have to walk on the dirt to get to the shed. When it rains, the dirt gets wet and muddy and makes you want not use the studio. In order to make the studio more useful during winter months, we decieded to put in a pathway made of concrete stepping stones.
Slideshow
8. Justification -There are many reasons to create an energy efficient house off the grid. Our class created a google doc with research and justification of renewable energy. Link to google doc below.
9.Generation of electricity -This was the final step in our journey in this project. Our mission was to design two windmills that we would test the power output of when blown with a fan on both medium and high speed as well as a leaf blower. The two types of windmill where HAWTs and VAWTs. HAWT stands for horizontal axis wind turbine and VAWT stands for Vertical Axis wind turbine.
HAWT:
VAWT:
Our Vawt was four bottle caps gued onto peice of cardboard. The problem with the design was we were forced to make the cardboard center bigger in order for the turbine to fit on the tester. It was much sturdier then the others and would have been much more effective in a real world senario, espectially on a slightly larger scale.
Reflection: During this project, everyone in our group worked fairly well together. We had some trouble stayig on task and working together. This was partly because the amount of diffrent projects going on at a certain time. For example, I did not do much work on the bonus project and coldframe but I did most of the work on the reflector. Even so, our group managed to pull together and make three great projects, even if they were allitle unorganized. Our presentations were redone the night of the prentation but it was still