Praxis I: Rigid Pipe Attachment for Water Bottle Filling and Washing at Chestnut Residence

Testing - Converging

Our splash radius test procedure was well-researched, but its usefulness was limited because the it did not verify the most limiting part of the design concept. During the verification and testing of our design concepts for converging, we used a test to determine the splash radius of a faucet attachment. This procedure is described in the extract below from our design report. It is also shown in the following video.

The test itself was well researched, and based on an academic article on splashing in medical cleaning settings. We also adapted the test in a reasonable way to make it possible to execute with the resources and materials available to us. For example, the original test protocol used special "blue moisture detection paper" [1], but we substituted this with paper towel. The test procedure was also detailed enough for us to follow it as shown in the video, and obtain results. These aspects of our testing process were successful.

However, there was an oversights in our planning of this test. Namely, our test focused on testing the splash radius of an uninterrupted stream of water from the prototype, not the splash radius while washing a bottle. This is problematic, since we would expect the splash radius to be much larger when cleaning a water bottle, compared to just letting the water flow into the sink. This means the test results did not reflect the most limiting or worst-performing measurement of the splash radius, and were therefore less useful in converging on our final recommendation. Thus, I've learned that when planning tests, it's important to ensure that the test protocol is actually testing the design concept at its most limiting or worst-performing point.