1. We Connected our waterwheel to a multimeter, and made sure our positive and negative charges were connected properly. We then et the multimeter to measure volts.
2. We turned on the hose and recorded the reading on the multimeter once every five seconds
3. We repeated step 5 but this time we set the multimeter to measure amps
4. We repeated step 5 & 6 three times
1.We took a pencil and marked a line 8.5 cm away from the bottom circumference of the 5 gallon bucket (rim where there is no opening), being sure this line was parallel to the rim all the way around. We essentially created another circumference from the rim.
2.We used a hand saw and sawed along the line. It was essential to be careful because how easy it is to make the cut uneven. Once we were done, our bucket was in two pieces. The part containing the bottom was now referred to as A and the part which now was basically a hollow cylinder was referred to as B.
3.Using a protractor, we made a mark every 36 degrees on A (almost like cutting a pie). The focus point of the protractor was right on the centre of the bottom of A (bottom of A was the bottom of the bucket). We made sure the line started at the center, went over the edge, and wrapped around to the other side. We also made sure the line we created on the lateral surface of A was marked darker with a permanent marker.
4.Using a ruler, we marked 10 points on the lateral surface of part A. The points were on the lines drawn in step 3, 1/2 in proportion away from any edge of the lateral surface.
5.The restaurant soup containers were drilled to the lateral surface A. This was properly accomplished by marking a line running parallel to the rim of the soup containers, (2 cm below the rim of the soup containers) and not all the way around. ¼ around in proportion to the container was enough.
6. We aligned the lines made on the soup containers to the lines made on A.
When we aligned the restaurant soup containers with A, the points marked in step 4 was visible. One of the two 2 sheet metal screws were drilled in on this point. Another screw was fastened just below the rim of the soup containers, which had no exact point of location.
7. We repeated step 6 for all of the soup containers.
8. The core of the water wheel was now complete
Procedures
Building the Waterwheel:
Experimentation
Post - Trial Data Analysis
Constructing the Rig
Waterwheel Base & DC motor
1. On one of the circular faces of the wooden rod, we drilled the motor hub using 4 wood screws so that the remaining wooden perimeter along the circumference of the hub was even throughout.
2. Using the wooden rod, we drilled the other circular face to the centre of the water wheel that was established earlier on (centre of the bottom of the bucket). Drilling was done in A not on the bottom of A. This was done using two wood screws, going side by side each other in the centre.
3. B was drilled using a 1 ¼ hole saw drill attachment. The top of the hole was 5 cm away from the cut edged rim (not the actual rim of the bucket, but the new rim you created).
4. Another hole was created directly across from the hole already made on B. This did not have to be exact, as the shaft of the water wheel only needed to go through (and be able to be turned freely).
5. The DC motor containing a mount was mounted with two sheet metal screws on top of one of the holes created in steps 2 and 3. The shaft on the DC motor was sticking out inside B.
6. We took the shaft that was connected to the water wheel and stuck it in the other hole which was previously created so the hub met the shaft of the motor. We stuck the motor shaft into the hub hole. There was no need to tighten the motor shaft to the hub hole as there was too much restriction, not letting turn it as freely.
7. The entire water wheel assembly was now complete.
1. We took the piece of tin downspout and cut it to 1.5 meters using the radial arm saw with a stone blade. We Zip - tied the piece of downspout to the ladder and made sure the downspout was perfectly perpendicular to the ground. The downspout pipe came down the centre between the two A-frame legs of the ladder. The height at which we zip-tied the downspout depended entirely on the size of the 5 gallon bucket bottom and our containers. It should be 47 cm away from the containers on the water wheel. To do this, we rotated the water wheel until one of the containers was parallel to the ground. We measured from the rim of the soup containers to the beginning of the downspout pipe.
2. We inserted the hose into the piece of downspout. We placed our waterwheel directly below the hose containing the hose inside it. We checked if the hose and the containers on the water wheel are aligned by rotating the water wheel until one of the containers were parallel to the ground. This container parallel to the ground was the one we used to gauge to see if of the water filled it.
3. At this point, we turned on the hose to check that a) the water wheel was able to rotate freely and b) the motor was producing power (we checked this with an LED)
1. We took the voltage at 0 seconds from Trial 1 and multiplied it with the ampere at 0 seconds from Trial 2
2. We repeated step 1 with the data at 5 seconds, 10 seconds, 15 seconds, 20 seconds, 25 seconds, and 30 seconds
3. We graphed the results from Step 2 into a line graph where the y-axis was watts and x-axis was seconds
4. We repeated steps 1, 2, and 3 for Trial 3 & 4, and trial 5 & 6
5. We used data from vancouver.weatherstats.ca and converted the Watts from Trial 1 & 2 into watt hours for a) the months with most rainfall (in our case, November); the average rainfall (in our case, June), and the least rainfall (in our case, August)
6. We plotted all three watt hour results from step 5 onto a line graph where the y-axis is the Watt hours and the x-axis is the seconds
7. We repeated steps 5 & 6 for Trial 3 & 4 and Trials 5 & 6
