Zach Reitman Hawken Projects 2021

Over the last few days, after the scraping of our wind turbine, we began working with the Bio-Barn Raising Intensive. For the most part, we just carried things out to the barn sight and oversaw some of the younger students in the intensive. Probably the most involved job we were tasked with was leveling spots on the ground by the barn site so that posts could be placed over them evenly. We did this by first digging down, then putting a layer of gravel on top. We then followed this by placing concrete pylons with a four inch by four inch groove for posts to sit. We started with the pylon that was the highest already without any gravel. We added gravel, then made it level to the ground. Then we began working on the other ones, leveling each by itself, then off the starting pylon. We did this until each of the 12 pylons was level. Then we put together the framing of the pavilion that the intensive had set up inside earlier and began placing the posts into the pylons, reinforcing each wall...

Throughout week 3 we focused mainly on the motor and our blade design. We had a lot of struggles working on the motor from the beginning, starting with trying to remove it from the washing machine. After that, we were faced with the struggle of figuring out what each of the wires coming off the motor does so that we can figure out how we need to rewire. After we came to a general consensus on what each wire was for, we realized that we were missing two capacitors. The start and the run. The start capacitor helps give the motor boost when it is first beginning to spin, then the run capacitor works when the motor is already spinning. While we were waiting for the capacitors, I started the design of the blade brackets. The blade bracket's main purpose would be to hold the aluminum blades firmly in place. Below you can see the design I made in illustrator.  The slits you can see in each arm are where the blades would be placed, then screwed in. There would be one near the top and one a...

 What a day! Nearly as soon as I get to school in the morning, I see an email from Cris Harris (one of our mentors) that we could swing by his house that morning to pick up an old washing machine. Why you may ask? Don't worry, I'll get there. Upon seeing that message, I gathered my partners and hopped in my car. First I had to drive home to get my dad's larger SUV because a washing machine would not fit in my car. Then we began the nearly hour-long drive from my house to Mr. Harris's house in Madison. The entire way on the highway, it was pouring rain. At some points it was coming down so hard I could barely see. That's beside the point though; in the end, we made it. After pulling around to the back of Mr. Harris's house, we quickly went into the basement, carried the washing up the stairs, and were back on our way to Hawken.  The picture above is from the underside of the washing machine. We needed the machine for the motor and possibly the gearbox. The motor ...

Early last week, unsatisfied with the performance of our prototype turbine, with creativity inspired by the materials at hand, we dove back into the blade design. In this attempt, we aimed for a more helical design as shown below.  This type of blade design is very effective for small-scale turbines with lower wind speeds. They are effective in these areas because of the very minimal weight and surface area which reduces drag. I had been thinking about this type of design for a few days, but, at the time, we did not have any materials available that could be bent/molded into a curved shape. However, as soon as I saw a fairly large sheet of thin, flexible plastic, my mind started racing, trying to think of ways that we could mold it. After some short trial and error with bending it around a large cardboard tube into a spiral shape, we realized we were on the right track. We put on some gloves, grabbed the heat gun, and proceeded to heat the plastic just enough so that it was pliable...

 Over the course of the last few days, we made a working prototype of our wind turbine.  As you can see, we generated less than a volt of electricity, but for such a small scale design and using a portable fan as a source of wind, that is not a bad start. Since then, we have made a few adjustments. for example, in the original design, we noticed that the rotational speed was being negatively impacted by the blade shape. When the wind would blow (the fan) it would catch in the large pockets, but before it could rotate up to the point where the next pocket would catch the air, the wind would hit the back of the next blade. To try and counteract this, instead of having the leading edge of the blade point in the opposite direction of the rotation, with pointed it towards the direction of rotation. We hoped this would catch the wind before it could hit the back of the blade. I think in the end, it created more drag, making the turbine get caught even more.  Over the next few d...

During the first week of our senior project, we got off to a little bit of a slow start. With all three of us having AP tests as well as other conflicts, we did not have a full day of work with all of us there. That being said, we were still able to get some quality work done. First, we cleared out the path that connected High Camp near the top of the bridge to the service road the Bio-Barn will be located on.  As you can see, the path is still not completely clear. There are still a few trees that are in the way, but with the tools we had (just loppers) we were not able to cut them down. At some point in the coming week, Mr. Harris or Mr. Digiorgio will bring in a chainsaw and we will be able to clear it out completely. The second task we completed was figuring out the height we are legally allowed to build the wind turbine without needing to work through zoning restrictions. After a quick call to the Chesterland Zoning Department, and a very helpful Michael Joyce, we figured out ...