sel43

Fall 2008

During the begining of the semester our primary focus was determining which parameters we would use to find the lower limit on plate spacing. The first design parameter considered was the shear on the the water through the settling tubes. Colette and I developed a shear equationwhich showed us that shear was in fact no the liminting factor. We next looked for materials to improve upon the previous apparatus. After discussions with Professor Weber-shirk and Matt Hurst we came up with a preliminary design and continued to explore the options for sedimentation materials. Finally the tube settlers similar to Matt Hurst's setup was decided upon and we ordered the necessary pieces. I have done several meeting minutes, but I try to deligate them to both Colette and Ling so they have experience documenting on the wiki and so I can make sure we are all on the same page as far as understanding the progress aof the project and where we are going. I also worked with Colette to update the goals page.

For the midterm report I focused on documenting the flocculation, floc blanket, and uniform flow in our system as well as editing the report and writing some of the minor sections of the report.

As team leader I have worked to tach Colette Kopon and Ling Cheung how to use the wiki to look up information and document our setup and methods. I am curently showing them how to use process controller and I have begun showing them the basics of mathCad. I try to deligate task so that they are challenging but aslo so Ling and Colette are comfortable with the task and do not feel overwhelmed since they are both new. I have spend extra time collaborating with Matt and Ian outside of our team meetings to make progress on the setup.

Spring 2008

First Half of Semester

The beginning of the semester was dedicated to completing the design for the Marcala Water Treatment Plant. My contribution to the completion of the design was updating the sedimentation tank drawing, to included the presence of two additional sedimentation tanks. I wrote a program to determine size of orifices needed to compensate for the difference in flow in the effluent launders. The office design program uses the head loss and size of the orifice diameter as constraints. The final write up is under review as will eventually be sent to Fred Stottlemyer. Along with the rest of the unit process team I worked on wiking the past report of the Marcala Water Treatment Plant.

For the remainder of the semester I have worked closely with the Hydraulic Design Team and Integration to write the master program. I worked in collaboration with my unit process teammates on the skeletons for the unit process portion of the master code. I then worked on mainly hydraulic design programs, including the grit chamber and channel function code found on the registrar. I am currently working with the unit processes team on the flocculation code for the master program.

Final Semester Contributions

I have continued to work with the Hydraulic Design Team functions, completing the channel function and contributing to the launder design function. After most functions were completed I helped review the flocculation functions as well as the plant elevation design function.
Towards the end of the semester I worked on trouble shooting the integration functions such as the master program, and inputs function. I worked with the AutoCAD on inputs function and making sure the correct variables and units were being output in the design functions, and I worked on the Design team presentation.
I also represented AguaClara in the Washington D.C. to meet with the Honduran Embassy, Water Advocates, and The New Forest Project.