"Fairmont State College"
(12th place overall; 14th in paper; 4th in presentation; 16th in product)

Presentation:

Fairmont strove to achieve consistency and said so while promoting their theme.

Four team members gave the presentation and after introductions, they outlined the project goals.  Then, the planning schedule and management strategy were explained.

The team said that last year’s design was scrapped, forcing them to go back to the drawing board.  They explained the changes that they made and why.  Input from paddlers drove the hull design.

The team explained their structural analysis and highlighted their structural elements.  They mentioned that stiffness was taken into account during the analysis.

The testing methods and innovations were outlined next.  The team elaborated on their mix design and the constituents used, and explained the innovations made during construction.  They described their reinforcement scheme and outlined the finishing techniques in detail.  After stressing how much they had improved, the team brought their presentation to conclusion.

Judges Comments/Questions:

Then the question period began:

  • Why does the elimination of fly ash make your mix difficult to work?
  • Can you describe the test procedure that you used for measuring shrinkage?
  • What were the objectives of your hull design?
  • What did you learn from the shrinkage crack tests and did you make any changes in response to your findings?
  • Why are there differences in the boundary conditions described in your paper and shown in the presentation?
  • Specifically, what did you do to offset shrinkage?
  • How were your dynamic load factor and factor of safety applied?
  • Did you experience any incompatibly when different admixtures were included?

Commentary:

The team did a good job considering this was the first time that they appeared at the national level.  The shrinkage test seemed to be of interest and may motivate some teams to look at this issue in future competitions.

Product:

Canoe Name: Consistent-C-33
Length: 20.6 ft
Weight: 190 lb
Color: Maroon and white

Fairmont’s canoe featured ribs and the team used three layers of carbon fiber mesh for reinforcement.  They employed ceramic spheres and perlite to help meet the C-33 requirement.

Vital Statistics

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