Final publication and Closing notes.

Finished project

First off, as you can see, we went with a pinwheel design instead of a classical design due to time constraints and construction stability.  (not to mention the lies of Amazon's 2 day delivery).

These two images show the gear train and pulley system. Half way through, we discpvered that 2 gear reductuons and a movqble pulley would cause the plow to move painfully slow. Therefore we resorted to a lesser gear reduction and no movable pulley.

Overall, she might not be very beautiful, or practical... But this project definitely helped us apply simple machines in a meaningful way. 

Wind Plow Technical Drawings

WARNING: Bad drawing and handwriting


Overall

Gear Train

Sled/Plow system

Turbine Construction

Project Design Brief

This post is a preliminary outline of the problem, the affected people, the criteria of success, and the constraints of the design.

Summary of Problem: The problem we have chosen to address is that people are getting tired of plowing their fields using animals. The animals must be fed, their enclosures cleaned, and they are expensive. People require a cheaper, easier way to plow their fields.

Who is Affected: All farmers who need to plow their field in order to grow crops are affected by the problem. People who buy the farmer’s food also are affected because the prices of food are higher because they include the maintenance the farmers must do to maintain the animals that plow the field.

Problem Validity: Indeed is the issue of animal powered plowing. While animals are costly and hard to maintain, as long as you have a consistent source of wind, you can maintain a plowed farm for little to no cost of maintenance.

Solution Criteria: To consider this project a success, our machine must be able to pull a plow across a fairly narrow field on command. The task must not be accomplished in an extensive amount of time and the task must be repeatable with few errors. Minimal human intervention is preferable.

Constraints: Our machine has a few issues by design. Due to the low torque from a power source such as wind, either the plow power will be insufficient, or the speed in which the machine works will be incredibly slow. Other than that, we will need to be careful to reduce friction as much as possible so that the low force applied by wind on a turbine still transfers to the plow.

Introduction and Objective

Introduction and Objective

      Objective:

              Build a model of a farm plow powered by a source of wind. We plan on doing so by using a stationary windmill with a turning turbine and increasing the ideal mechanical advantage (IMA) using gears and the attached movable pulley, in order to have enough torque to pull the wide plow using the previously mentioned movable pulley system.



     There are three people total working together to build this project.
           - Kelan Barr (me) = Mechanical Engineer: Build simple machines that act in a way to complete the task most efficiently.
           - JP = Project Manager: General overview, makes design decisions and decides group direction.
           - Thomas Wicklund = Industrial Designer: Foundation building, creates structurally supportive and reliable building platforms.