Team:Cornell/notebook/drylab/week 5

Entry:

This afternoon, Dan organized a dry lab meeting focused mostly on the team website. Most of us met our main website designer Eric for the first time today. Tall, skinny and pale, Eric was not timid when it came to voicing his opinions about the website layout. His professionalism and grasp on modern style convinced us that he was the right person to spearhead the construction of our new website.

The subteam discussed the format of the website’s “notebook” section. An ensuing heated debate led us to reevaluate the purpose of the notebook. We drew inspiration primarily from DTU and Imperial College London’s iGEM websites. And we finally agreed that the notebook should be more than a log of activities and should be lean closer toward a blog, conveying information in an engaging, well-organized manner. The notebook would be divided into two general categories: biological and mechanical--each category further dividing into detailed sections (such as naphthalene or chassis design). We decided to emphasize structure with the use of hashtags. Ultimately, entries would start with the date and an interesting one-sentence overview, briefly narrate the day’s events, and end with relevant hashtags.

#website #notebook #hashtag

Entry:

Digging into the details about the chassis, Dan, Manny and I struggled with the roof design. We shied away from a domed roof because of limitations in the machine shop. When we found that that polycarbonate can be bent through heat treatment, so we considered a trapezoidal ceiling that would fit over 3 solar panels. After juggling back and forth between round and edged roof, we went with a triangular roof and a trapezoidal base, creating a septagon (more commonly termed, heptagon) profile. Standing true to our geek roots, we dubbed our prototype “Septimus Prime,” the first remote surveillance vessel equipped to monitor various toxin levels in water for months at a time.

#chassis #optimus prime

Entry:

Grabbing our usual tables in the Duffield atrium, we talked about the numbers needed to keep Septimus Prime afloat. In its 120 lb glory, a volume of 0.085m³ is required; however, only the device only holds 0.02m³. We thought it best to deal with the issue by attaching buoys rather than expanding the chassis, which would greatly inhibit portability. Manuel then brought up the figures for the chassis. Weighing around 20 lbs, the chassis should be made lighter. Potential solutions included cutting wedges out of the ¾” aluminum walls and decreasing the number of internal support rods. Ultimately, we opted for another material: polyethylene. Almost as strong as aluminum for about a fifth of its weight and a sixth of its price, polyethylene is a more economical material in every way. Go, plastics!

#chassis #material selection