Wind Turbine Tower Project Details
Your company is competing with other engineering companies to win the bid for Hala Industries' renewable energy structure!
The following companies are currently competing:
Introduction
The design-build Wind Turbine Tower project will give you an opportunity to design a combined civil and aero structure using concepts learned in class. The goal is to demonstrate the iterative design process and specifically the importance of design-build-test and redesign. You will subject your structure to seismic and wind loads. There are three main goals of the Wind Turbine Tower project:
Design the blades of a wind turbine that are aerodynamic and capable of producing as much energy as possible.
Design the frame of the wind turbine structure to withstand a lateral load (seismic or wind) and maintain adequate stiffness.
Create an “efficient” structure that utilizes the least amount of materials but still performs well during steps 1 and 2 above.
This is a competition! Your goal is to score a higher Performance Index (P.I.) than the other teams in order to win! It is critical that you and your partner work together to maximize the P.I. as best as possible.
Project Overview
Over the next three weeks, you and your partner will work together to create the best possible design proposal to submit to CREE for review. In order to meet the submission deadline, your team has decided to split the prototype design between your two best engineers. One partner will be focusing primarily on the BLADE DESIGN portion, while the other partner will be focusing primarily on the TOWER DESIGN portion.
Since you and your partner both have COSMOS kits, you will both be designing and building separate parts. However, you must work together to make sure each half of the structure can integrate with the other - the TOWER must be designed to hold the BLADES. All aspects of this project, including work time and testing, will be done during the afternoon sessions every day (2:15 PM - 4:00 PM).
During Week 2 of COSMOS, you will focus on designing, building, and testing your half of the structure. You will be given opportunities to build and test two different designs for both the BLADES and TOWER. During Week 3 of COSMOS, you will focus on creating drawings of your half of the structure that will be given to your partner. Your partner will then build your half according to your drawings, and attach it to their half. By Week 4, each of you will have built a matching final structure of the BLADES and TOWER that will be tested for final results.
In general, if you think you might be doing something to “cheat the system”, please ask the instructional team first. We want this competition to be fair, and we are unable to think of every possible detail in the rules so when in doubt, please ask.
Proposal Submission Deliverables
Your company's application to CREE and Hala Industries must include:
Team Member Profiles - each partner will create a unique personal resume following the guidelines taught in Science Communication
Physical working prototype - instructions are provided below for each prototype portion (BLADES and TOWER)
Drawings of the proposed design - each partner will create hand sketches of their final prototype portion, in addition to a combined computer model of the entire final prototype
Short video showing the prototype’s iterations and performance - please film and photograph your work as you go!
Written proposal technical report - a short team report highlighting significant aspects of the design and presenting your final performance results
Presentation summarizing the proposal - technical presentation written and delivered by both partners
Deadlines for each deliverable can be found on the main SCHEDULE page. The deadline to submit final versions of the application is July 30, 2021 at 4:00 PM PST (i.e. you will finish all this by the end of COSMOS!). NOTE: The final submission date has been extended by two days from original published date.
Remember, the Science Communication sessions will teach you the technical basics of a majority of the deliverables above, while all work will be done during the COSMOS Design-Build sessions where we will give you guidance on how to complete each deliverable.
Blades Prototype Design
Tower Prototype Design
Overall Company Performance Index
β = Magnification factor
Aesthetic P.I. = Teaching team rating of company's overall creativity and build quality
Higher total P.I. = Better!
See Blades & Tower Design Criteria pages to view how their respective P.I. are calculated
The Judging Committee has posted information regarding the aesthetics criteria for the Performance Index, see below!