Recently in Concrete Canoe Category

The Concrete Canoe Team's new construction method seems to be earning great dividends at a time when very few other investments are. The boat "hatched" from the mold in great shape, and the dual innovation methods of lining the mold with foil tape and spraying the concrete into the mold have really paid off when a smooth-sided boat emerged that should speed through the water. The Miners planned a concrete mixture that is about 10% lighter by volume than water, so floating should be a breeze. Before the boat was hauled to S&T's secret research lake for the all important swamp* test a few crew members had to grind down the rough concrete gunwales, otherwise climbing into the boat would be a bit uncomfortable.

We don't yet have pictures of the inaugural boat launch. It is spring break right now, so most students are gleefully ignoring email messages requesting photos. We do know that the boat floated very nicely, even popping back to the surface when pushed under the waves, so now only light sanding and a bit of decorating is needed to get the boat ready for April's regional races. Oh, yeah, and practice, practice, practice**. The Miners still have to build display stands and a representative cross section and prepare their engineering data and oral reports. There is even discussion underway to recycle an old steel bridge frame as a wheeled support structure. That's a good thing, because anyone who has carried one of these canoes will tell you, it may be able to float, but it is still concrete.

*The swamp is not where they take the boat, it's what they do. At ASCE-sponsored competitions each team must prove that if its the boat rolls over it will remain buoyant enough that it can be recovered. If a canoe doesn't pop back to the surface the team is assessed penalty points and must add some floatation chambers. That's a whole lot easier from trying to recover what would essentially be an eighteen-foot-long rock from the bottom of a lake.

** Most canoes have a keel that runs the length of the boat, making it easy to paddle in a straight line. The stone boats aren't so lucky and it takes a lot of body english and well-coordinated paddling to do well in the slalom and endurance races. And that, of course, is where the fun begins.

On weekends S&T's campus usually gets pretty quiet, but that certainly doesn't apply to the Miners' vaunted student design teams. This weekend started with SAE uber-judge Steven Fox giving a fascinating, insightful and humorous 3-hour seminar about race car vehicle dynamics, design approaches, strategy, and the evolution of rule-making at major SAE competitions. With Steve's decades in the auto manufacturing you might think he'd concentrate on an engineering design that might save the industry. Instead he focused on the design process; how a team accomplishes its goals, the best way to stay focused on the design challenge at hand, and the importance of bringing in new team members at the early stages of design so the team's entire knowledge base doesn't suddenly disappear on graduation day. He stressed the old saying that "those who ignore the past are doomed to repeat it", emphasizing that design teams must know the history of design so that the mistakes of the past are not repeated at great cost in time, materials, performance and money. Another old saying that crept into his talk was KISS, and if you don't know what that means, well.................
After dinner at world-famous Alex's Pizza, the Miners hosted a shop tour and turned the table on Steve by presenting the design approach that recently earned S&T Racing world-ranked recognition. Team members showed Steve their plans for a wheel mounting system that will reduce the component count by 40% and save considerable weight at the corners. This after-pizza was an excellent rehearsal for the design presentations that are a critical part of most student design events; you might win all the races, but if you can't explain how or why you did it you probably won't win the event. If you were in industry you won't be able to get the financial backing to put your project into production, and you might not have a job any longer so it pays to do your calculations and test and verify at each benchmark. Steve frequently praised the S&T FSAE group for its commitment to growth and innovation, their strong emphasis on pre-race testing, and their ability to stay ahead of schedule.
FSAE wasn't the only student taking advantage of the class-free time. The Concrete Canoe Team went into full-scale production Saturday with a new and far less labor-intensive method for building the unlikely craft. Mark Ezzell, Patrick Tilk and a few others were the mix-preparation squad, keeping a soup-like concrete slurry ready for Matthew Struemph's spray gun. Their new system, the results of which haven't yet been tested in water, should strengthen the boat because it will eliminate seams that can lead to cracking. The actual (proprietary?) mix includes fine glass beads to help reduce weight and make the craft more buouyant, and anyone who has tried to carry a concrete boat will agree that's a great idea.
Mixing the material in finely-measured small batches had another advantage. A group of very bright engineering students from Atlanta happened to be visiting campus and when told they'd see a boat made of concrete they were quite incredulous. The boat builders took a few breaks to host the potential transfer students, explain how the Miners often work in open-ended design challenges, and show their guests the fun and appeal of a S&T education.
Lastly, S&T'S baja and solar car teams both were toiling away in the background. Casey Boyer stayed busy producing car parts on the SDELC shop lathe, while Dan Welty and several new team members toiled away on plans for Solar Miner VII. The spring semester is when the teams, who typically design the systems in the fall, get into full production.

Final exams are occupying the thoughts of S&T's design team members, but that doesn't stop the Miners from working on their design projects. The fall semester is typically when the teams begin work on their various land, air and water craft, and construction gets in full gear right after semester break.
The Concrete Canoe Team has already undertaken some testing and training for their new design. New members got a chance to practice the team's traditional concrete application methods, and for those who haven't seen the hectic assembly-line process imagine a dozen or more students mixing concrete and rolling it out like pizza dough then placing each gooey slab in the form like a mosaic.
For 2009 the crew is trying something new. First they've lined the canoe mold with foil tape to get a smoother surface finish and make it easier to remove the boat from the form. They are also using a new (to them) spray-on process known as "shot-crete" to apply the mix. Compressed air powers a hopper gun and sprays the slurry onto the form much like heavy spray paint. It will take layer after thin layer, interspersed with reinforcing mesh, to keep the canoe strong. The Miners feel that this will provide a more uniform structure, improve air entrapment, and strengthen the boat by eliminating the patchwork seams of years past. Taking a break from final exams is mix designer Matthew Struemph spraying the first test batch, Patrick Tilk placing the mesh and team leader Mark Ezzell evaluating the process.
One hush-hush feature of the new process is the hope that the boat will be significantly lighter. Anyone who has tried to move these boats on land OR water will greatly appreciate that feature.

OK, in case you can't tell, the splashing on the left is NOT geese diving for food. It is an unidentified Miner coming to the surface using a kick-stroke. Word is that our bow paddler was swinging the paddle so frantically that he didn't realize he was splashing water INTO the boat. The faster he went, the deeper the boat settled. Wonder what the rear admiral was doing all this time?

And now after he jettisoned his bow-buddy, the rear admiral begins his solo slog to the finish........

This may turn out to be a struggle between pride and hypothermia...........

.........and to the cheers (or laughter) of the other contestants, nears completion of the race. At least he didn't go down with the ship.
While no one can say the guys didn't finish the race, maybe they can take some lessons from the women, who clearly seem to know that you keep the water UNDER the boat..........

Maybe that's why Miner women tend to take more leadership positions on campus, have higher GPAs, and stay drier.

Missouri S&T took on water and had to abandon canoe during the first outing today on Lake Fayetteville. It took a heroic effort, but the canoe ("Shamrock") was saved and even pulled across the finish line (to huge applause) by a determined (and cold) S&T swimmer. We got video of this (maybe) and will post it Monday. If we were to make a feature film, we're sure it would be a lot like that movie Rudy. We've also got some photos (hopefully) of some S&T women paddlers who tried to give it another go later but kept getting sideways in the water (at least they didn't sink). It doesn't look good for S&T, in terms of winning the 2008 concrete canoe regional. But we can report that the weather is nice and team members are having a great time anyway and keeping their heads high and mostly above water. Apparently, their presentation to the judges yesterday was a big hit -- because they were informative, funny and entertaining. We'll follow-up on all of this and post whatever video and photos we have by Monday afternoon. For now, it's back to Missouri.

FAYETTEVILLE, ARK. -- Well, Missouri S&T's 2008 concrete canoe REALLY looks good (everybody says so), but the green-and-sand-colored vessel called "Shamrock" didn't pass the "swamp test" today with flying colors. In fact, it stayed sunk like The Edmund Fitzgerald. The idea is to dunk the canoe in a big trough and see if it floats back up to the surface -- this is a precautionary test to make sure the canoes don't sink to the bottom of Lake Fayetteville tomorrow when the real racing events start. Missouri S&T will now have to equip Shamrock with extra styrofoam before hitting the lake.

Team members weren't too disappointed, though, because their canoe floats just fine as long as it's not full of water AND because the swamp test only counts for five percent of the overall judging AND because Mizzou's canoe failed to resurface from the bottom of the trough, too, AND because, as one astute Miner pointed out, the canoes are made out of CONCRETE for crying out loud.

With much sadness we can report that the University of Arkansas has retired its Hogtanic canoe, which was such a big hit last year, especially when the monstrosity rolled over on its side and dumped its passengers during a particularly ill-fated outing. This year's Arkansas entry is called 3 Sheets To The Wind, and it actually passed the swamp test.

The Missouri S&T team members say they enjoy the company of the Arkansas team but that the University of Oklahoma is probably the favorite in the competition. Oral presentations in front of judges are going on right now. We'll be back at some point with updates and photos of Saturday's racing action. The Missouri S&T team expects strong performances by its paddlers.

P.S. We probably won't have new photos (of racing action) until we get back to Rolla some time on Monday. But we'll try to give you a feel for the canoe racing stuff some time Saturday P.M. The results are appropriately fluid. Unless you're in first, nobody really knows (or cares too much) where they stand in the overall standings. That's why we love this concrete canoe thing; it's pretty laid back and fun. Having said that, we really appreciate how much engineering work (and old-fashioned trial and error) goes into getting these things to the point where they're actually seaworthy.

What floats your boat? How ‘bout a desert-style racing vehicle in a lake? Dow Chemical’s generous donation of blue foam sheets becomes the building blocks of nearly every team project.

The concrete canoe builders use the water jet lab to cut out dozens of foam panels (above) that make up the mold against which the concrete is formed. Solar car uses the lightweight material to form the body on which the solar cells are mounted, the Advanced Aero Vehicle Group covers thin foam sections with Kevlar to form the plane’s ribs, the Formula SAE, Human Powered Vehicle, and Land Speed Challenge racing teams all use the rigid foam to mold their body panels, and the Baja team even used Dow’s product to build its highly successful flotation chambers for its amphibious off-road (get it?) race car. Thanks, Dow Chemical!!

OK. This is the infamous Hog-tanic. Now, we shall never speak of this again.

P.S. The Advanced Aero Vehicle Group is getting ready to fly its ultra-cool remote-control aircraft in a competition this weekend in Texas. Watch this site to find out how much payload the UMR aircraft can carry. Also, we'll try to get the obligatory photos of crashes.

This is the very last post about concrete canoes, period, for a while. We promise. Unless you want to see a photo of The Hog-tanic going belly up? But that would probably be in poor taste. We want to keep the focus on all of the positive stuff that's going on with the UMR design teams and we don't really want to waste any more space on hilarious disasters from Arkansas like The Hog-tanic -- unless, of course, you really want us to. Comments anyone?