Tag: engineering

Concrete Cloth – Makes Durable Shelters Within Hours

By Anupum Pant

Today we have something which civil engineers would be extremely proud of – A recent innovation in concrete technology that has an immense life-changing potential – The concrete cloth; certainly a splendid engineering marvel.

What is it?

It is material which feels like a very thick canvas and has a three-dimensional fiber matrix. This piece of thick cloth is impregnated with a specially formulated concrete mixture. Once it is completely wet with water, it hardens into a thin, strong, fire-resistant and water-proof material, within a few hours. Commercial variants either have a hydrophobic coating on the outer surface or a PVC lining from the inside to make it completely impermeable to water.

Concrete Cloth

Since it just a thick piece of canvas impregnated with concrete, it can be transported fairly easily and can be made into various shapes to be used for different applications. For instance, it can be used for rapidly deploying hardened concrete shelters for people in need. It works like this:

  1. You carry a huge concrete canvas balloon with you in a truck.
  2. Place it wherever you need the shelter to be deployed.
  3. Pump water into it.
  4. Quickly start inflating it using a pump.
  5. Pull it around using, say a truck.
  6. Wait for it to harden.

Advantages:

  • To erect a shelter with concrete canvas, it only takes a fraction of the time taken to construct a shelter using tradition building techniques.
  • Unlike cloth tents, this one is extremely durable and can last for about 10 years. Moreover, it protects the residents from any form of extreme weather outside (Thermally insulated).
  • Construction material is light enough to be transported by a small pickup truck.
  • Requires just 2 people and can be deployed to a ready state within 24 hours – Within these 24 hours it gains about 80% of its full strength.
  • Can be tailored as required with the help of staples, cuts and nails / screws. In fact cutting it before hardening is not much different from cutting a thick piece of cloth.
  • Does not burn and is water-proof.

[Read more]

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Fascinating Gear Videos + Moving Gear Fixed in Concrete

By Anupum Pant

Almost everything that has something spinning, probably has, one or a system of gears hidden inside it. Open up a CD drive, or anything that spins, and you’ll see. Mechanical engineers spend a good amount of time learning about traditional gear systems in their courses. I’ve compiled a few gear videos here, that are probably not covered in any educational institution’s syllabus. (please inform me in the comments section if you have them in your course)

1. Crazy shapes: While, It is popularly believed that gears have to be circular to work properly, it should be noted that gears can literally bear any shape and work fine, as long as they are designed well. In the following video we can see how carefully designed gears in square, oval, spiral, fish shapes, and any other out of the ordinary shapes, can be made to work together perfectly. [video]

Some other artistic wooden gear sculpture can be seen in the link here. Engineering meets art [Here]
Build at home: Turns out, with computers in every home these days, designing these gears isn’t rocket science. Enterprising engineers can use this fairly detailed 5-minute video tutorial to cut out weird gear shapes at home. The process of designing can be automated by using jerry’s script. [video]

2. Unpredictable moves – Gears can sometimes work together to provide a mechanical advantage in a system and can end up moving in a pretty unpredictable manner. The following video is a perfect example of how gear ratios can mess with the heads of non-engineers. The guy calls his machine – under the ruler faster than the ruler – watch it and you’ll understand why. [video]

It isn’t magic. If it still confuses you, here is a great post that explains a similar phenomenon that uses gears to build a “faster than wind cart (DDWFTW)“.

3. Reduction gear system with a fixed gear in the end: I wanted to keep this craziest reduction gear system for the end. It is the one that blew my mind. And the ones who think the number 1 and number 2 are ordinary systems they meet everyday in the lab, they need to check this one out.

This system designed by Arthur Ganson transcends engineering and moves into the realm of art. It consists of a motor that spins at 212 revs per minute. To the motor are attached twelve 50-1 reduction gears in series.

The most incredible part – the last gear in this series appears as if it is fixed, but it actually turns. It moves so slow, that it has been sealed into the wall using concrete. Even when the motor is turned on, it appears fixed with rest of the system moving continuously. It is estimated that if it wasn’t fixed, the gear would have taken 2 trillion years to make a complete revolution. In fact the third and the gears after that in this system don’t appear to be moving too.

Lycurgus Cup – An Ancient Nanotech Marvel

By Anupum Pant

The concepts of modern nanotechnology must have been first seeded in the year 1959 by the renowned physicist Richard Feynman, but Romans were already doing it back in 300 AD (around 290-325 AD). About 1700 years back, utilizing the principles of Nanotechnology, Roman engineers had crafted a magnificent chalice – Lycurgus Cup (picture). Like the Prince Rupert’s drop, this is another glass marvel you should know about.

Side note: You can listen to the legendary lecture by Dr. Feynman on YouTube – There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom, where he discusses the “possibility of synthesis via direct manipulation of atoms”, or Nanotechnology.

Lycurgus cup description

The Lycurgus cup was probably the first ever optical artificial [meta]material – Ruby Glass – engineered to have properties that may not be found in nature. Its unusual optical properties are something that makes it stand out.

Normally, the cup appears green, but if it is illuminated from the inside or lit up using a light placed behind it, it glows ruby-red; hence the name, ruby glass. This kind of glass is known as a Dichroic glass. Dichroic  literally means ”two colored” and is derived from the Greek words ”di” for two, and ”chroma” for color; in this case, the colors green and red.

The technology behind this cup baffled scientists for around 40 years (from 1950s to 1990s). It was only in 1990s that they figured out how it really worked. The goblet has been preserved well, and is presently at display in the British Museum.

Dichroic glass

Dichroic glasses do not use paints, dyes, or any coloring agents for the color. They are made using fine coatings on glass. The coatings themselves do not have a color, but rather they bend light to reflect colors like a prism does, to make rainbows.

These colors are visible due to the presence of very minute amounts of finely ground gold and silver particles in it. Romans could have included these powders unknowingly as contaminants or might have added them on purpose to achieve the very effect, we’ll never know.

Inspired by an age-old technology

NASA, in the 1950s, used a similar technology to fabricate a kind of glass that could selectively reflect light wavelengths. They achieved this by depositing a thin-film of metal on the glass.

With innumerable combinations of oxides, glass colors and patterns available, the possibilities to utilize this phenomenon for various useful purposes are endless.
The unusual properties of this cup have also inspired material scientists to create concepts for an invisibility cloak using modern nanofabrication technology. [Source]

I want to study interesting materials like these

If you think the Lycurgus cup, Wolverine’s claws and Aerogels (If you haven’t heard about it, you must definitely check this out!) are awesome. You can make a career in researching materials like these by making a foray into Materials Science and Engineering. Most good universities offer a course in it. It is a budding field, growing at a rapid pace, replete with real-world challenging conundrums waiting to be resolved.

Drones beyond Amazon’s Drone Delivery System

By Anupum Pant

For a long time I’ve had this idea noted in a file and the hottest news from Amazon, linked to a “revolutionary drone accomplishment”, pushed me into writing it down. Since I cover topics ranging from a gamut of areas in the name of science, I thought, through this article, it would be appropriate for me to enable my readers see beyond an ongoing viral news topic – The unveiling of Amazon’s drone delivery. If you haven’t seen it already, you’ll find the video here. [Video] [details here]

Long before Amazon released its concept of Premier Air, 30 minute delivery, the idea – usage of drones for things you wouldn’t have thought of – has been tested or put to use in several related ways. Some of the reported tests and uses of drones are as follows:

Drones for food delivery: During June 2013, with an idea (read: PR stunt) that would inspire Amazon in the future, Dominos U.K. released a test video of the “DomiCopter”. In the video they showed an unmanned drone picking up a Pizza and delivering it to the customer without having to encounter any traffic in between. Slick! But, that isn’t all.
A year before this, Taco delivering drones as well as a Burrito bomber drones were also seen. All of them had gone viral. Yet, we still have a long way to go to see these delivery systems working legally.

Mosquito killers: A North Florida-based company that supplies drones for military missions, showed a drone that would speed up detection of stagnant water. As a result, helping the authorities cut mosquito breeding grounds in Florida.

Hover Cameras: Golf channel tested a new way of filming golf tournaments using drones this year. Besides that, we’ve seen drones being used for sports photography and journalism too.

Drone Waiters: To promote a new product, YO! Sushi, a London restaurant started using ‘flying trays’ for bringing burgers to their customers. These flying trays were nothing but drones carrying food trays. Also, it increased their speed ‘exponentially’.

Drone Constructors: This project dates back to the year 2010-11. Two architects, Garamazio and Kohler demonstrated aerial construction using unmanned drones. However, they demonstrated building process for a heavily scaled down version of a building using foam bricks. Nevertheless, it was an achievement in the year 2011, when QuadroCopters were just starting to get popular.

Although we have seen a lot of unusual uses for drones being demonstrated all around the globe (many more creative uses remain to be seen), we are yet to see their practical implementation; especially for projects like the Amazon drone delivery, which require drones to move around in a complicated airspace (in terms aviation rules).

Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is actively working on rules for unmanned aerial vehicles. Still we won’t see drones moving around legally and freely, any time before 2015.

Everything else you’d want to know about drones: PopSci

Yakhchal – An Ancient Cold Storage Marvel

By Anupum Pant

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During a period when electricity was only a thing for the Gods, around 400 B.C.E., in the hot-arid deserts of Iran where temperatures touched 40 degree centigrade, ancient engineers had found a way to keep their ice from melting. Two thousand years back, a cold storage facility was being used. The impressive thing about it – it was clean and sustainable technology.

What are these?

Yakhchals, or ice pits of ancient Persia were the huge mounds (buildings hollow from the inside), which made it possible for Persians to store away the ice for summers, meat, dairy products, other food items and chilled frozen Faloodeh for the palace. Beside treats for the palace, the method of preserving ice was so professional yet simple that even the poor could afford it.

Structure and Working

The structure of these buildings above the ground is a large mud brick dome, often rising to about 60 feet in height. Below it are large underground empty spaces, up to 5000 cubic meter in volume. This space had access to wind catch and often contained a system of wind-catchers that could easily bring temperatures inside the space down to frigid levels in summer days. The structures were built so well that many still remain standing.

Working: The massive insulation built into the walls (due to the use of a special mixture of sand, clay, egg whites, lime, goat hair, and ash) and the continuous cooling waters that spiralled down its side kept the ice frozen throughout the summer by evaporative cooling (just like those mist fans). They also had a trench at the bottom to catch water from the molten ice and to refreeze it during the cold desert nights. The ice was then broken up and moved to rooms deep in the ground. As more water ran into the trench the process was repeated.

Geography: These were built in the areas that had suitable condition for producing natural ice or places where there was feasibility of water freezing during the cold nights.

Major architectural elements: 

  • Shading wall – To avoid direct exposure to sunlight and to let the structure remain cool in the shade.
  • Provisional pool – To supply water for evaporative cooling to take place.
  • and Ice reservoir – To keep the cycle going. Freeze > Melt > Refreeze at night and so on…

The end of Yakhchal (reasons)

  • Since the advent of electricity-guzzling freezers and air conditioners, unfortunately, the use of these architectural wonders has been considered as foolishness. This is probably the reason no Yakhchals are being used for cold storage anymore.
  • Desert storms, caused a lot of erosion to these structures, especially to the ones that were isolated in the desert regions.
  • Since Yakhchal’s ice formed in the open it was prone to combining with dust and resulted in contamination. That was another reason it wasn’t considered as a choice useful enough for modern purposes.

Hit the like button if you learnt something from this article.

4D Printing is Here

By Anupum Pant

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We had just started getting comfortable with printing objects in 3D, and 4D printing is already here. Early this year, in the month of April, Skylar Tibbits, an architect, designer and computer scientist at MIT, gave a revolutionary demonstration explaining their advances in the field of 4D printing at a TED conference. This was an initial proposal and it got things moving at a rapid pace.

Side note: In the world of 3D printing:

What is 4D printing?

At first 4D printing sounds like a catch phrase, it isn’t really just that. 4D printing is actually 1D better than 3D printing and it aims at making objects out of a 3D printer, that can reconfigure themselves into useful shapes, on their own. For instance, think of a non-living stick changing itself into a 3D cube as time passes. In short, 4D printing will enable us to create living objects without any living cells, micro-processors, chips or batteries involved. Sounds simple enough, but the promises are nothing less than extraordinary.

In the TED talk attached below, Skylar explains how a string of plastic placed in water can turn itself into the letters MIT. But, this was something that happened back in April. Things have moved further.

A few days back, Researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder revealed a successful test of their 4D printing technology. They were able to print out flat objects using normal plastic combined with a smart material which was able to turn into a cube on its own. Cubes are just the start.

According to scientists, in the future, 4D printing will probably churn out smart car bodies that would heal automatically, smart soldier uniforms and advanced building materials. Imagine a camouflage material that changes to match the surroundings, that could be the future. Or a pipe that contracts and expands to move water without pumps. Or a building material that builds itself into a structure. 4D printing could probably best suited for building in an extremely hostile environment like space. The possibilities are endless.

But, let us not get ahead of ourselves. It is almost impossible to predict what we’ll actually see in the future. Things have just started to happen in the field of 4D printing. But, it sure looks amazing. What will you build?

Deal with Poverty or Go to Mars?

by Anupum Pant

Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) launched its Mars orbiter, Mangalyan (Translation: Mars Craft) on November 5th 2013 with a hope to become the 4th such organization in the world, to step into Mars exploration. I must say, it is quite a fete for a developing country which has to deal with a myriad of other socio-economic menaces. Besides that, this mission also placed India above every other Mars mission ever, in terms of the total cost involved. Frugal engineering, has helped ISRO to go to Mars with low costs – with a mere $73 Million dollar budget, MOM (Mars Orbiter Mission) has become the cheapest mission ever to Mars. [silly comparisions to put this into perspective]

Side note: India’s other pioneering low cost endeavors – World’s cheapest car; World’s cheapest tablet and cheapest house.

But, this successful launch came with a throng of detractors, ridiculing India for not using these $73 Million to deal with poverty (or “clean feces off its roads”). Clearly, they did not think it through before making such comments.

  1. A nation’s economy is a huge and complex thing. Things aren’t as simple as, stop space exploration funds and divert them to tackle poverty. A number of things run in parallel. Also, every nation has its own set of problems and they don’t stop spending billions of dollars for technological advancement to focus only on social or economic issues. And, I’m sure that the government India is also taking enough steps to tackle its national issues with a firm footing on advancement of technological avenues like space exploration.
  2. The main part of this article: In contrary to what is popularly believed, money spent on space exploration does not nebulously float out of earth (on the other hand, distributing this money among the poor would breed complacency among them and cause the money to literally float out). It plays a major role in creating new technologies, products, jobs and businesses. Let us take the example of NASA here:
    Space exploration has led to development of many things that you use daily. There wouldn’t have been any computers, wrist watches, Velcro, cell phones, GPS navigators etc, if funds were never allocated to the “wasteful” space research.  Without this, there is a chance that you wouldn’t have heard of solar energy, cryogenics or even robotics. Also, several improvements in health care, energy and the environment are a result of research done for space exploration. [10 NASA inventions you use everyday].
    When you think of all this, $73 Million seems like an extremely small number. Remember, that this is also helping other businesses (vendors etc) flourish, which in turn are creating jobs for the poor and spurring innovation.
  3. Thirdly, The Indian Space Research Organization is a unique organization which has managed to stay the world’s most profitable space organization and has sustained on a minuscule budget of about $1 Billion. It relies on the Indian low-cost mantra to develop innovative technologies. As a result, this intelligent government venture has helped to create a profitable environment for space research. Hence, it isn’t a “wasteful” allocation of funds. Additionally, with its engineers living off a small salary ($20,000) as compared to American engineers ($100,000), we can definitely place our trust on an organization like ISRO – Like previous missions, they’ll make much more than $23 Million from this mission too. In other words, they’ll bring money in, not let it float out (better option for dealing with poverty, than just distributing it among the poor).

That said, 21 out of 51 missions to Mars have failed and it means that there is still a long way for this absurdly low-cost Indian mission [also a risky one] to be a completely successful one. So far, it is doing pretty good. We can only wait and see, what the end will be like.