الثلاثاء، 27 سبتمبر 2011

Optimization of Wind Turbine Blades

Wind turbine design is the process of defining the form and specifications of a wind turbine to extract energy from the wind.A wind turbine installation consists of the necessary systems needed to capture the wind's energy, point the turbine into the wind, convert mechanical rotation into electrical power, and other systems to start, stop, and control the turbine.Windmill Kites is one of the best example about what design improvement can do.


In 1919 the physicist Albert Betz showed that for a hypothetical ideal wind-energy extraction machine, the fundamental laws of conservation of mass and energy allowed no more than 16/27 (59.3%) of the kinetic energy of the wind to be captured. According to Betz's law, no turbine can capture more than 59.3 percent of the kinetic energy in wind. The ideal or maximum theoretical efficiency n max (also called power coefficient) of a wind turbine is the ratio of maximum power obtained from the wind to the total power available in the wind. The factor 0.593 is known as Betz's coefficient. It is the maximum fraction of the power in a wind stream that can be extracted.

power coefficient = Cp =( power output from wind machine) / (power available in wind )

Design is vital for any wind mill to function well and efficiently. If we can improve its design , power generated by windmill would increase significantly.

This project idea is for students interested in CAD. They should try to design most optimum wind turbine blades. In the video given below , I have shown you one such design.

Related Video:


Related PDF:
Rochester Institute

Projects:
Windmill Power generation System

الاثنين، 26 سبتمبر 2011

Manufacturing Project Ideas


Manufacturing is a process to develop products for self use or sell. This process is largely associated with the industries which we called manufacturing industries.

There are many projects which you can do as a student of this field to improve efficiency , lowering raw material wastages and making things green.

I am discussing some of these ideas below :

1.Thermodynamic Analysis of Manufacturing Processes Engineering

2.Applications for the Plastics Industry

Plastic industry manufactures and sell polymers in various shapes and sizes. They are used in construction of bridges, buildings and roads.
Many house hold goods are also made up of plastic.

3.Green and Efficient Materials :

Green Manufacturing

4.Use of Waste Resources

5.Reducing waiting time for individual product.

6.Lead time reduction and capacity increase strategy in coil manufacturing for electric motors


Useful Links:

Planning Process in Manufacturing Systems

الأحد، 25 سبتمبر 2011

Biomechanics Projects

Biomechanics is the study of the structure and function of biological systems by means of the methods of mechanics.It is very important branch of science and also very helpful to the athletes who participate in Olympics.

Bio Mechanical Project Ideas:

The best ideas about this topic I have found so far are available at University of Wisconsin-Madison College of Engineering click here.

Professor Jonathan Butcher and Jack Thompson Projects

Effects Of Shear Stress And Tensile Strain On Cell Mono-layers

Effect of obesity on Walk of humans : you can study the effect of obesity on human body. When weight of the body increases, it can cause change to our walking habit. You can study about this topic.

Design human body parts : In a year millions of people around the world lose there one or more part of their body due to accident or natural disasters. We can help those individual by developing these for them.

Design robots bio mechanically : If you have ever build robot, you know that designing them is very difficult task , you can take help of human or animal body dynamics in their design.

Instrumentation design projects

Related :
Mechanical Projects

السبت، 24 سبتمبر 2011

Microbial fuel cell


A microbial fuel cell (MFC) or biological fuel cell is a bio-electrochemical system that drives a current by mimicking bacterial interactions found in nature.A microbial fuel cell is a device that converts chemical energy to electrical energy by the catalytic reaction of microorganisms.


According to BBC Science and Environment ,US researchers say they have demonstrated how cells fueled by bacteria can be "self-powered" and produce a limitless supply of hydrogen.Microbial fuel cells hold promise as a new source of electricity by their unique ability to generate an electric current from waste products.

Modeling the processes in microbial fuel cells could pave the way for improving the voltage output and take us one step nearer to using these devices to produce electricity.

How Microbial Fuel Cell works?

We all need food to survive, in the same way, bacteria needs energy to survive.

 Bacteria get this energy in a two-step process :

The first step requires the removal of electrons from some source of organic matter (oxidation).

The second step consists of giving those electrons to something that will accept them (reduction), such as oxygen or nitrate.

If certain bacteria are grown under anaerobic conditions (without the presence of oxygen), they can transfer electrons to a carbon electrode (anode). The electrons then move across a wire under a load (resistor) to the cathode where they combine with protons and oxygen to form water. When these electrons flow from the anode to the cathode, they generate the current and voltage to make electricity.


Related Video :




Hydrocarbon Fuel Processing in Solid Oxide Fuel Cell
SOFC is a solid state device that produce electricity directly from oxidizing a fuel at elevated temperature. It consists of porous ceramic anode,electrolyte(dense layer of ceramic) and cathode as thin porous layer. It uses ceramic electrolyte with inexpensive catalyst at high temperature of around 700 degree Celsius and has large thermal innertia.More Info

الأربعاء، 21 سبتمبر 2011

Bending Light

Objective : Study about light and what happens when it gets bend.

Refraction is the change in direction of a wave due to a change in its speed. This is most commonly observed when a wave passes from one medium to another at any angle other than 90° or 0°.


Category : Physics Project Idea

Grade : 8th class students

Difficulty : Easy

Experiment :

How does light bend in sugar water :
Fish tank filled with sugar water solution (5 parts water, 1 part corn syrup) and left to settle over the weekend results in an index of refraction that varies with depth (greater at the bottom of the tank). Because of the variation in the index of refraction, light bends instead of traveling in a straight line.


Things to know :
Snell's Law : is a formula used to describe the relationship between the angles of incidence and refraction, when referring to light or other waves passing through a boundary between two different isotropic media, such as water and glass.

Electromagnetic Radiations : is a formula used to describe the relationship between the angles of incidence and refraction, when referring to light or other waves passing through a boundary between two different isotropic media, such as water and glass.

Speed of Light :  299 792 458 m / s

Sun is 150 million km 's away from earth. Can you imagine , with the speed of light , it takes only 8 minute 19 seconds to reach from sun to earth.You can measure speed of light yourself with the help of microwave. In the video given below , it has shown that how we can measure the speed of light with the help of wave formations on chocolate .


Permittivity:

Absolute permittivity is the measure of the resistance that is encountered when forming an electric field in a medium. In other words, permittivity is a measure of how an electric field affects, and is affected by, a dielectric medium. The permittivity of a medium describes how much electric field (more correctly, flux) is 'generated' per unit charge.

Optics :

Optics is the branch of physics which involves the behavior and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that use or detect it.Optics usually describes the behavior of visible, ultraviolet, and infrared light.

Ray Tracing: In computer graphics, ray tracing is a technique for generating an image by tracing the path of light through pixels in an image plane and simulating the effects of its encounters with virtual objects.


Fermat's Principle : Fermat's principle or the principle of least time is the principle that the path taken between two points by a ray of light is the path that can be traversed in the least time. This principle is sometimes taken as the definition of a ray of light.

Related Posts :

Physics Project
School Projects
Kids Project

الاثنين، 19 سبتمبر 2011

School Projects

Ultraviolet Rays :
Ultraviolet (UV) light is electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength shorter than that of visible light, but longer than X-rays, in the range 10 nm to 400 nm, and energies from 3 eV to 124 eV. It is named because the spectrum consists of electromagnetic waves with frequencies higher than those that humans identify as the color violet.
Useful Links :

What is ultra violet light ?

Projects :
What duration of ultra violet radiation kills bacteria ?
Modeling of these rays
What Materials Glow Under a Black or Ultraviolet Light?

 

Bio-Insecticides And Pesticides :


Bio pesticides and insecticides are biochemical pesticides that are naturally occurring substances that control pests by nontoxic mechanisms. Conventional pesticides, by contrast, are generally synthetic materials that directly kill or inactivate the pests.



Useful Links

Pesticides in Organic Farming
An intro to Organic Pesticides 
Managing Houseplant pests

The effects of water impurities on plant growth:


It more or less depends on what type of impurities are ? If impure water has harmful chemicals then it will definitely affect growth of the plant. In this project you need to find out about the impurities which harm plants as well as those from which plant started to grow faster.

Useful links :

Is it important for the greenhouse grower

Waste Water Management:



Water is one of the most important asset of human life. Even though there earth is surrounded by 70 % of water, large percentage of human population is facing problem of water shortage. With the help of effective water management we can reduce this problem with some extent.

There are two important ways for water management :

1.Waste Water Management :  The process of removing contaminants from waste water and household sewage, both runoff (effluents) and domestic.
2.Industrial Water Management

Useful Links : 

Presentation on Sewage Treatment
Water Management Project Video 

Pocket guide for first aid: 

Major damage can be avoided if proper first aid is given on time. You can create your own first aid book which has all the necessary material required by the patient.

Agriculture :

1. indigenous designs of farm machinery, agricultural implements and practices.
2. issues related to the animal health and food safety
3. ecologically sustainable farming methods
4. innovative/inexpensive/improved/ indigenous technology/conservation and
transport of agricultural and animal products and food materials.
5. rainwater harvesting and storage
6. river water sharing, efficient and equitable use.
7. application of biotechnology, microbiology, genetic engineering for improved and
high yielding varieties.

Read More

How Oil Spills effect the life of Sea Species: 



In our life we have seen multiple occurrences of oil spills around us. Most recently world was shaken and shocked  with the magnitude of gulf of mexico oil spill. Effect of these spills was not much on humans with respect to animals living there.

More Projects :

Microbial fuel cells

Chemistry 

Sterilization of Water using Bleaching Powder:

Sodium hypo chloride is a chemical compound with the formula NaClO. Sodium hypo chloride solution, commonly known as bleach or Clorox, is frequently used as a disinfectant or a bleaching agent.Sodium hypo chloride has been used for the disinfection of drinking water. A concentration equivalent to about 1 liter of household bleach per 4000 liters of water is used.This process is called Shock Chlorination . Shock chlorination is used in many swimming pools, water wells, springs, and other water sources to reduce the bacterial and algal residue in the water.

Disadvantage: Its effect on health is still widely debated.



Bio-Diesel and Bio-Petrol:
 

Biodiesel refers to a vegetable oil- or animal fat-based diesel fuel consisting of long-chain alkyl (methyl, propyl or ethyl) esters. Biodiesel is typically made by chemically reacting lipids (e.g., vegetable oil, animal fat (tallow)) with an alcohol.

Biodiesel is meant to be used in standard diesel engines and is thus distinct from the vegetable and waste oils used to fuel converted diesel engines. Biodiesel can be used alone, or blended with petrodiesel. Biodiesel can also be used as a low carbon alternative to heating oil.





Fertilizer (or fertilizer) is any organic or inorganic material of natural or synthetic origin (other than liming materials) that is added to a soil to supply one or more plant nutrients essential to the growth of plants.[1] A recent assessment found that about 40 to 60% of crop yields are attributable to commercial fertilizer use.

Naturally occurring organic fertilizers include manure, slurry, worm castings, peat, seaweed, humic acid, and guano.Although the density of nutrients in organic material is comparatively modest, they have many advantages. The majority of nitrogen supplying organic fertilizers contain insoluble nitrogen and act as a slow-release fertilizer. By their nature, organic fertilizers increase physical and biological nutrient storage mechanisms in soils, mitigating risks of over-fertilization. Organic fertilizer nutrient content, solubility, and nutrient release rates are typically much lower than mineral (inorganic) fertilizers




 Measuring Solubility of Saturated Solutions

Saturation is the point at which a solution of a substance can dissolve no more of that substance
Solubility is the property of a solid, liquid, or gaseous chemical substance called solute to dissolve in a solid, liquid, or gaseous solvent to form a homogeneous solution of the solute in the solvent. The solubility of a substance fundamentally depends on the used solvent as well as on temperature and pressure.

Study the Setting of Cement

Cement sets when mixed with water by way of a complex series of hydration chemical reactions still only partly understood. The different constituents slowly hydrate and crystallize while the interlocking of their crystals gives to cement its strength. After the initial setting, immersion in warm water will speed up setting. In Portland cement, gypsum is added as a compound preventing cement flash setting. The time it takes for cement to set varies; and can take anywhere from twenty minutes for initial set, to twenty-four hours, or more, for final set.




Some Related Topics on Cements :

Portland Cement Hydration
Environment Consideration on Cement
Use of Waste Plastic in cement Concrete

Measure the Amount of Acetic Acid in Vinegar


Acetic acid is an organic compound with the chemical formula CH3COOH. It is a colorless liquid that when undiluted is also called glacial acetic acid. Vinegar is an acidic liquid produced from the fermentation of ethanol in a process that yields its key ingredient, acetic acid (ethanoic acid). It also may come in a diluted form. The pH of table vinegar ranges from 2.4 to 3.4[1] (higher if diluted). The acetic acid concentration typically ranges from 4% to 8% by volume for table vinegar[2] and up to 18% for pickling vinegar.

10th grade chemistry projects
I received lot of emails related to school projects of chemistry. I have selected few topics which I am going to discuss in the next few posts.In them I will discuss about the given topics , method of doing them and what is the importance of these experiments in real life.

Redox reactions
Conductance in electrolytic solutions,specific and molar conductivity,variation of conductivity with concentration, Kohlrausch's law(Details click here)
Electrolysis and laws of electrolysis(elementary idea)
Dry cell,Electrolyte cells and galvanic cells ; lead accumulator
EMF of the cell
Standard electrode potential
Nernst equation and its application to chemical cells.Fuel cells,
Corrosion
More Chemistry Projects

Related PDF :

Acetic Acid Content on Vinegar
Concentration of Acetic Acid in Vinegar

Useful Links :

Know more about Acids and Basics 

Maths

Statistics

Statistics is the study of the collection, organization, analysis, and interpretation of data.[1][2] It deals with all aspects of this, including the planning of data collection in terms of the design of surveys and experiments.

1. Mathematical models related to environment.
2. Mathematical models of heart, brain, kidney, language, bone etc.
3. computer diagnosis of human diseases.
4. probability for the accuracy of calculators and computers.
5. applications of mathematical equations used in understanding various nuclear and
sub-nuclear processes.
6. mathematical models of physical geography such as rotation and revolution of
earth etc.
7. applications of mathematical equations to biological solutions.
8. studies of storage and retrieval techniques for computer systems.
9. statistics and random number problems.


History

History Project Ideas

Geography

Hydrology Projects

Urbanization : 

Large number of people are migrating towards the city to find better job. According to one estimate in 2030 around 60 % of world population would live in the city. You can make model of this project where you can show people who are migrating to cities where they are getting good jobs while leaving behind calm and peaceful life of villages.

Global Warming :

You can make project of global warming as well as how it is effecting our earth. If you want, you can explain the factors due to which global warming takes place.

Physics

Trebuchet Project

Bending Light
Working models of production of electrical energy from mechanical sources:

Windmill power Generation System
Water Turbine Power Generation 
Solar Power Generator 

Design of fuel-efficient or no pollution engines:

Compressed Air Cars 
Air Powered Bike
Hydrogen Powered Vehicle


Design of solar heating devices :


Solar Water Heater

Projects Based on Solar Energy :

Solar Energy Projects

Mechanism of extraction, storage and processing of fossil fuels.
Principles and design of solar panels and solar still.
Renewable Energy Projects
Effects of landscaping and architecture on energy consumption.
Methods of heat retention in materials.

Physics Projects

Computer

History of Computers :

This project is for kids of class 7th or 8th. I would be very fascinating for them to know more about computer which they know now and it was when they were not even born. With this experiment they will amaze that how much computer has changed after its invention.

Computer Shop

This project is about shop management , it is very advance topic and would be recommended for 12th grade students. In this project they would made a computer shop software which keeps the data about stocks in the shop, daily sells and things like that.

Travel Agency for Class 12th

C++

Railway Ticket Reservation :

This is a software which is used as ticket windows of railway platforms. They book your ticket and allot seat for you. They need software to do things faster and this software is Railway Ticket Reservation system which keeps data of how many tickets are already booked? how many seats are remaining? what is the cost of ticket and stuff like that.

Periodic Table
Library Management System
More Computer Projects

Maths Project :

Polygon Analysis : Determine a formula that calculates the number of diagonals in a convex polygon in terms of number of sides. Base Difficulty

السبت، 17 سبتمبر 2011

Internal Combustion engine Project

IC Engine which is also known as Internal Combustion engine are engines where combustion takes place inside the engine.It is different from external combustion engines such as Stirling engine and Steam Engines where combustion takes place outside the chamber of engine.
Projects :

Stress Analysis and Optimization of Crankshafts :    The main objective of this study was to investigate weight and cost reduction opportunities for a forged steel crankshaft. The need of load history in the FEM analysis necessitates performing a detailed dynamic load analysis. Therefore, this study consists of three major sections: (1) dynamic load analysis, (2) FEM and stress analysis, (3) optimization for weight and cost reduction.

Computer Simulated Engine Performance

Useful Links :

Animation of 4 Stroke ICE
Hydrogen internal combustion engine
IC Engines simulator 
detonation frequency analysis
Engine Modeling of an Internal Combustion Engine
Air Compress Car
Air Bike



Related PDF :

Rotatory Internal combustion Engines ::One of the smallest combustion engine used to power batteries.
Design and Experimental Results of Small-Scale Rotary Engines

Related Video :

Related Projects :
Stirling Engine

الخميس، 15 سبتمبر 2011

Income Tax Calcuator


How this tool would be helpful?

Income tax calculator is very useful tool for every day users. Every one of us need to calculate our payable tax each year. This task become much more complicated when we have different sources of income and each has different rule from income tax department.


For Whom : This project idea is for Computer Science(CS) and Information Technology (IT)Students.

Level : Easy

How to build it ?

As always to build any software project , we will follow water fall model as you have studied in Software engineering class :


Requirement Analysis :

This is one of the most step for any computer science project. In this step we find out complete requirement for this project including customer's requirement and software requirements. Very important questions such as Why we need this particular project? Who are end users? Things like that should be answered in this step.

Database

We will database to store user information, tax rules information and stuff like that. For this project we will use Mysql as our database engine.

Which type of Application it is going to be?
We are going to make it a web application because this application needs regular updates about the IT rules and if we made desktop application , it would be extremely difficult for us to update the database of each and every customer.

With the help of web application users from different countries can use it without worrying about updating it manually because administrators of this application would keep on updating and adding new rules whenever applicable.

Programming Language:

After knowing that it is going to be web application it is easier to decide that it is going to be php application. There are two reasons behind my selection :
First, PHP is very popular language and free books and tutorials are easily available online.
Second its free, PHP is open source language so that its totally free to use and it gets updated time to time with better functionality.

I have discussed some points for our planning phase but you can add many more details in requirement analysis , because bigger it is , better your software will be.

Design :

There is going to be two sections for our income tax calculator :

Administration Section : Owner of the application can edit the income tax rules and modify the data such as rates which is necessary.

User Section : Where user can select his or her country or state, so correct tax rules can be applied for his tax form. After that there would be income form to be filled ,which eventually gives user total amount of tax to be paid.

You will need pencil and blank papers for this section , draw design of all the pages which are required , draw form , its label , specify where you need text field, radio button or combo box.

Implementation :

Download Wamp server and start working with the help of simple notepad. To code you should have good knowledge of php , read some free tutorials on internet if you don't have that.


Verification :


Software testing can be stated as the process of validating and verifying that a software program/application/product:
  1. meets the requirements that guided its design and development;
  2. works as expected; and
  3. can be implemented with the same characteristics.
There are three types of testing whose explanation is out of the scope of this post but you can read more about them by clicking on links below :

1.White Box Testing
2.Black Box Testing
3.Grey Box Testing.


Maintenance :

Software's are never complete there is always scope for improvement. So, our income tax calculator too needs continuous upgrade for new features and technology.

For your help you can download source code and application itself from the links below :

Income Tax Calculator :

OpenTaxSolver : Open Source Income tax calculator written in C

TaxMagic :A simple open source/free software tax calculator written in .NET

Tax Estimator :U.S. Federal personal income tax estimates using the RushTaxOS taxEngine.

Related Projects : 

Computer Engineering Project ideas
Java Project Ideas
How to answers Projects

الاثنين، 12 سبتمبر 2011

automatic parallel parking cars


What is Automatic Car Parking ?

Automatic parking is an autonomous car maneuvering from a traffic lane into a parking place to perform parallel parking, perpendicular or angle parking.

What's the importance of this topic? 

Parking is one of the challenging thing for humans in Car Driving. Even though , lot of solutions available for smooth and safe driving such as car collision avoidance system, but very less focus is given to the the automatic parking system till recently. Although,many cars are now available with this feature such as Toyota Prius , still there is a long way to go.

For Whom :
Mechanical, Electrical, Electronics and Computer Science , almost all branches.

Level : Difficult
It is not an uncomplicated task to build up automatic parking expertise for a car. First of all, the car must be able to sense the surroundings, to find a free parking space and to detect obstacles in the car park.
Secondly, it should have the capability to plan the movement itself from the input of sensitivity system.
Lastly, it should be able to go after the premeditated motion sequences and to make sure that a goal position is reached, regardless of noise and errors.

Useful Links

How Self Parking Works ?
Camera based intelligent parking system

Related Video : 



Source Code :

Java  : Vehicle Parking

الأحد، 4 سبتمبر 2011

Pedal powered Grinding Mill

Grain grinder needs no introduction, it has a significant contribution in our life whether we have it at our home or not but we all are dependent on it for our food. This project idea is for mechanical and physics students.



There are basically two types of grinders :

1.Automatic Electric Machine driven grinder
2. Human powered grinder

Purpose: This project is based on human powered grinder. Instead of driving it by hand , we would use cycle pedals to grind wheat or other grains.

Concept:  We will connect cycle wheel with grinder using different gears.By rotating wheels with the help of pedal , our pedal powered grinder starts to rotate. Remaining all the parts works as they do in traditional grinders.

Merits :
1.It will save electricity
2.Easier to maintain
3.Make yourself fit.

Useful Articles:
Will bike for food

Related Video :

Compound gear reduction chain drive

 

Related PDF :
Portable Pedal Power 

Related:
Solar Energy Project Ideas
Physics Projects

الجمعة، 2 سبتمبر 2011

Mini bio fuel gas turbine


A gas turbine, also called a combustion turbine, is a type of internal combustion engine. It has an upstream rotating compressor coupled to a downstream turbine, and a combustion chamber in-between.In mini bio gas fuel turbine, we would rotate the turbine using energy of bio fuel gas.
Tiny Bio Gas generator 


Bio fuel is a type of fuel whose energy is derived from biological carbon fixation. Bio-fuels include fuels derived from biomass conversion, as well as solid biomass, liquid fuels and various bio gases.
In this project we would use bio gas as a fuel.

Merits of bio gas

Biogas is produced by the anaerobic digestion or fermentation of biodegradable materials such as biomass, manure, sewage, municipal waste, green waste, plant material, and crops.Moreover, bio gas has 60 % of Methane gas which can be used as productive gas to rotate a turbine.  To read more about bio gas uses click here.

Concept

When we fill the dump or waste in tank , and cover it tightly to cut the supply of oxygen , bacteria starts producing methane gas inside the tank. By connecting this tank with the tube we can use this methane gas. In this project we would use this gas to generate electricity.

How it works ?



Bio Gas plant at home :

Useful PDF :

Fabrication of functional mesoscopic ceramic parts for micro gas turbine engine

Technical summary of combined power plant

Source Code :

Python : Gas Turbine Developer "gtdev" is an open source tool which assists the engineer in developing a new gas turbine (1D Thermo and Aerodynamics). It is created by the student research group "Hummingbird - TUM Gas Turbines" placed at the LFA, TU Munich