HUMAN POWERED VEHICLE WRITE-UP

The goal of this project was to design and create a human powered vehicle, capable of racing around the track. The vehicle with the fastest time would win. The vehicles must be human powered. They must be of an original design; meaning it can't be a copy of a design already in creation, (like a bike.) During the performance, no body parts are allowed to touch the ground, and you could not use pre fabricated parts (i.e. a whole bike frame).

Our group interacted very well. My group consisted of Ian Creelan, Avery Cook and Patrick Murphy (myself) [picture does not include Avery, he is camera shy]. For the most part we agreed on ideas and when we didn't we took a democratic vote when necessary where the majority won. This worked well, especially for Ian, and I because we almost always ended up on the winning side. I generally trusted our group members to do what needed to be done and didn't get to angry when things were done wrong.. If the idea worked then we would go with it, but if it was fallible then of course we would have to scrap it. Our group communicated well. We communicated our ideas and opinions using words and would draw sketches to enhance group understanding.

We originally considered making a two-wheeled bike because bikes go fast, reliable and proven to work well. Mr. Reid shot us down; saying, "making a bike was not an original idea." Still we wanted to make a two-wheel vehicle. The benefits of a two-wheel vehicle are that the drive system and steering are not complicated and easier to construct and more likely to work and it very stable at a good speed. We decided to try and make a pedal powered scooter. The construction of this vehicle was very simple and took only two weeks to design and construct. We built the whole frame from scratch and various other parts. After the construction we noticed that our "scooter" looked very similar to a low riding bike without a seat. People accused us of cheating so we decided to make a side cart for our pedal powered scooter. The side cart was relatively easy to construct and design. We only ran into one problem with the side cart. One problem was with the attachment of the side cart. The side cart was bolted to the frame of the pedal powered scooter and was not able to pivot which is essential for turning. At first we decided to ignore this problem, because we thought the correction of this problem would be more of a hassle than the problem than it was worth. We were ready to start another human powered vehicle. After riding it a few times we decided hinges were essential for the vehicle to be able to turn and work properly. After finishing our Petal Powered Scooter and side cart we decided to create a new vehicle and make the hinges to let the petal powered scooter able to turn properly with the side cart. For our next vehicle we decided to make a compact, three wheeled vehicle with two wheels in back and one wheel in front with the ride in a recombinant position and the crank up front. The negative aspects of this design are that it's a little unstable (if you were not accustomed to riding it) and the drive system is fairly complicated. For the frame of this vehicle we wanted to use box tubing because it was strong, compact, and worked well with our design. We encountered a few problems while making this human powered vehicle. Many of the problems of this project were related to the drive system. The first problem was due to the chain. Because we had such a long chain, it would often derail. To fix this problem we added chain tensioners. The largest and last problem was that our drive shaft got bent. This was a significant problem because it caused rear chains to derail and skip. We decided to build a better and stronger drive shaft with solid stock in the middle. After we remade the drive shaft we discovered that the gears were mis-aligned, causing the chains to derail even more. We fixed this by cutting off the gears and rewarding them on in the correct position. But still the chain derailed. We fixed this by making sides on the sprocket which kept the chain from moving side to side. Once this was done our human powered vehicle was ready to go.

The construction of our vehicle was the high light of this project. During this project my group and I learned how to weld.. Welding is an important and useful skill to learn, and will help me in the future. In addition to welding we used a number of other power tool such as; hand drills, drill press, metal ban saws, chop saws, and side grinders. Grinding was very importance o clean up welds and shape the metal how we wanted it. For our project we used many prefabricated bike components (as with every other group) such as; wheels, handlebars, cranks, petals, shifters, bake levers, brake lines, chains, chainstays, durlairers, brakes, brake bosses, headsets, and gears.

When this project was finally finished, I had gained and improved many useful skills that will help me in the future as an engineer and as a human being. During this project I improved upon many of my people skills. Not everyone has the same ideas, so to create a successful working environment, you have to compromise and combine different people's ideas together to form one great idea (hopefully). I also learned how to use some of the tools and work ethics of the engineering academy; such as not to leave electrical devices plugged in when they're not in use and don't place expensive equipment near the edges of the worktables. One of the skills I appreciate having the most is the knowledge of welding. These skills could prove useful to me in the future. During this project I think my group worked very efficiently and effectively. As an active participant of my group, my role was mainly to help design and build the project and help direct my teammates. Due to my good knowledge of bikes I helped greatly in the bike mechanics part such as getting the derailers aligned, connected the brakes, and attaching the chains. Even though our project didn't turn out exactly how we planned it turned out great, and I am very pleased with what we have accomplished.