Time Flies...

I can't believe it's already the end of the year. Well, the last few weeks have been rather stressful. I've been rushing to get the paper for WREC up together. It seemed only yesterday I had got the abstract accepted, and then I was rushing to get the paper in. With help from my supervisors and friends in the lab I managed to get what I think was a fairly good paper into the conference. We'll now see what the reviewers think. After submitting, I was asked to review some other submissions, which seems a bit strange to me, but I'll give it a go!

The turbine rig has been taking up a lot of my time. From the CAD drawings to the final build has been quite quick, just a matter of months. Using the workshop's new laser cutter I've managed to make a lot of the components from thick acrylic, which has helped to reduce the build time. I found the main problem with the laser was that it didn't produce square edges, making the assembly of the casing rather difficult.

Finished turbine rig

We've run the rig with air, attaching the air line to the inlet of the turbine. With a little assistance initially the turbine turns and a can measure a torque, which is fantastic. The problems we've had with the air in starting the turbine shouldn't occur with the water, as it is almost 1000 times more dense so for the inlet flow, it would produce around 1000 times the force. The testing is going to be fun!

I've received most of the components now to fit out the hydrolab in the university to test the turbine in, the pipe work and fittings I'll need to install with the help of the lab technician Jack. There has been a lot of discussion about the best way to achieve the varying pressure at the turbine inlet, there is only one example of a turbine test rig in literature and so I was allowed quite a free reign on ideas. They varied from one that resembles a pico hydro system installation to using the header tank in the lab and bleeding off any excess pressure. Eventually, in the solution we have chosen the water will come down from a header tank in the roof, and the pressure will be controlled through ball valves to ensure the correct pressure at the turbine. We also have wide range of heads to deal with from 0.5m to 3.5m at the turbine, which may cause a few issues. So, the first part of the testing is to see how well we can vary the pressure at the turbine inlet before starting to spin the turbine.

As well as the rushing around, I've managed a bit of time to travel around, the work for Bad Girls kept me in Bristol most weekends for the last few months. At the end of November I went to Paris, which was great fun. We took a bus ride across which was good value, but the other passengers were slightly irritating. I've spent a lot of time on buses in Nepal in the most uncomfortable of positions, but I have to say the 7 hours to Paris had to be one of the worst rides I'd had. The Eurotunnel and company did make up for any lacking in fun on the journey though. Paris always is fun, so much to see and do, it's like walking around a film sometimes so many sites that you've seen on TV. We went up the Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe and walked for many many miles around the streets. The hotel was in Montmatre, an interesting place most famous for Moulin Rouge, and we certainly found some 'different' shops around. Along the Champs Elysees there was a German Christmas Market, which was strange for the middle of Paris.

The Eiffel Tower lit up at night

The 'interesting' shops around our hotel

Eating a hot dog from the German market

I also went on a bit of an explore around Bristol. All the time I've lived here, it's always been on or near the Gloucester Road to the north of the city. Up and down the Gloucester Road, several buses ply their trade, and I catch them relatively regularly to the city centre, but never beyond. So for an adventure we decided to go for a ride to the end of one of the bus lines, which apparently would take us to Hengrove Depot. I had heard rumours about the south of Bristol - there were only dirt tracks there, people talked a different language, no running water and electricity was only used as an attraction. All of these rumours proved to be false, they had roads, running water and electricity, although their accent was even more bristolian, if that was possible. So, for anyone else thinking of catching a bus to the end of the line, do it, it could be a fun day out (we found a cinema and Harry Potter!)

Have a great Christmas and New Year!

SAM

Firsts

This last month has been a month of firsts.

At the end of October, I got my first abstract accepted for a conference. I wrote an abstract on the turbine selection method I've used to select my turbine, and submitted it to the World Renewable Energy Congress (WREC) Conference in May 2011 which will take place in Sweden. All this means that I actually have to write the paper I had envisaged when I wrote the abstract (argh, might be quite difficult!) and I will require a trip to Sweden in May next year to present it (yeay!).

I've spent most of the time since finishing my first year report designing my turbine test rig. I've ordered the first few components and these have been slowly starting to arrive. I'm particularly excited about the torque transducer, a little shaft inside a box that will measure the torque coming from my turbine. It uses strain gauges bonded to the shaft, and a wireless transmission of the torque valve back to the output. Can't believe how much of a geek I'm turning into...

HBM Torque Transducer

As some of the components designs have been fixed, I've also cut my first pieces out. The workshop in the university has acquired a 2D laser cutter, able to cut some plastics and wood. The designs from CAD can be directly loaded onto it, meaning a short lead time between designing and actually holding the finished component. This has been quite exciting for me again, I've been able to draw something on my computer, then a few minutes later I can hold it in my hand. I've now built my first assembly in the rig.

First assembly for the rig

The other side to the turbine rig is the way to control the head, and allow it to vary between the required values. As the turbine testing will be carried out in the university's Hydro Lab, it must be able to fit in there. We've been looking at the many different options to use and control the flow available from the header tanks in the lab. It's not something I had immediately thought of, how will I control the head? I mean, the aim of the test is to test the turbine, so that's what I've been focussing on, but there are many other parts behind the main headline test that need to be thought of and designed to ensure the testing is relevant, accurate and repeatable. This is my first foray into experimental research, and I'm learning a lot.

All in all, the PhD seems to be progressing OK. There are a few frustrations I'm hitting up against. As in all universities, the workshop are overworked, so any custom pieces I need them to make may have a long lead time. I also have to give myself a bit of a kick up the backside. I've got a lot of different parts to this project, the turbine experiment, turbine modelling, grid control development, literature, papers etc. and I need to keep on top of all of them. At the moment, I feel as if I'm letting some of them fall by the wayside to allow for the things that excite me the most currently - most particularly the turbine rig. I need to also keep myself in check, make sure that I don't make rushed decisions on things.

During the last week of October I was Deputy Stage Manager (DSM) for my first show, Bad Girls - The Musical. A DSM controls the show, giving the go for the start, all the lighting, sound and other cues. The first few runs through the show were very stressful, trying to make sure that everything happened. But as the week went on, all the technical team got used to the play and we really clicked. They were all fantastic, especially as for most of them it was the first time they had had a technical role. The play was reviewed by the Bristol Evening Post, the review can be found here. Overall, I think the play went amazingly well, I'm looking forward to the next one now.

And the next show isn't too far away. The final first is that I'm producing a talent show at church, with lots of help obviously (thanks in anticipation Howard, Vera, Cherry, and all the performers!). So Saturday night will be an evening of interesting talents, very much looking forward to it!

SAM

One Year On

One year in, 2 and a half left. How time flies...

(There are some more random photos again to brighten life up a little!)

Star cakes made for a bake sale at church

In the last month since coming back from Greece I've been mainly writing up. I had already written up all of the turbine selection work, so this report was mainly a summary of that, and the literature I've found on my concept design, as well as some initial results from simulations of the systems. Although writing up is never fun, it has been a very useful process. It has helped me to get a deeper understanding into different control techniques and methods. It has shown me where the holes are in my current research and plan the future tasks. My supervisors, Bernard and Julian, have also re-introduced me into academic report writing, which was something very different to working in industry. After many late nights, early mornings and fiddling with Word to get everything in, I finally managed to hand in my report on the 4th October, only one working day late. I will be the first to admit it's neither perfect nor complete. However, I'm quite pleased with it. Now comes viva time...

Cress head man (he didn't grow any cress sadly)

Along side the work on my report, I've been looking at developing a rig to put a turbine in. This will then be put in the hydrolab in the basement of the Engineering building here, and will form the basis of my mechanical experiments. Designing this not only requires thought about how it will work, but also what I want to test, measure and what I want to show with these tests. So to do this I've been re-introducing myself to 3D Computer Aided Design (CAD). I remember the hours and days spent whilst I was an undergrad sat in front of a computer designing things. It's amazing how annoying, frustrating and fun it is all at the same time. I've also spent an afternoon learning how to mill, as the workshop here have 2 mills and 2 lathes students can use. When I start designing and building, I've got to try and manufacture as much as possible myself as it will take a long time if I put a job into the workshop.

Trees are the poems the earth writes upon the sky (Bristol Zoo)

Bad Girls is going really well still. The cast are absolutely amazing, the set is coming together. It's performing at the end of the month, so I'm going to be fairly stressed and tired then I think. Fingers crossed that everything goes well!

I've also been tasked to organise a DIY Talent show at church, where the audience perform. I've not really organised anything since the failed Variety Show in my final year at Shrivenham. I'm slowly getting performers volunteering, and have enough to fill half a show now. I'm hoping that more turn up, otherwise it's going to be a lot of Sam, which no-one really wants...

A railway warning

I also fulfilled a boyhood fantasy at the beginning of October. Since I can remember I played with Lego, I contribute it to one of the main reasons to becoming an engineer. So, with some friends we took a day trip to Legoland Windsor. It was fantastic, the rides were possibly a bit childish, but to be honest, I'm rather childish too, so they fitted me down to the ground. I especially liked the miniature Prince Albert Bridge in their miniland.

Winning the cup!

So, I've got an interesting few weeks ahead. I'm going to be building soon, getting my hands dirty, and moving forward with the electrical side. Bad Girls will be amazing, if anyone can do come and see it (there is some adult content), you can buy tickets here, and I'm taking the youth fellowship from church out in Bristol tomorrow. This could be dangerous...

For now

SAM

Greek Island Hopping

I've been in Greece for the last 2 weeks, for Luzmila's Wedding. I flew into Crete and then caught the boat to Folegandros and Milos, spending a few days camping and exploring in each, before meeting up with everyone for the wedding in Santorini. The wedding and parties were amazing, Luzmila looked amazing. I then went back to Crete for a couple of days before heading home. It was great to have a relaxing holiday, I read a lot of books, visited beautiful beaches and saw more white Greek Orthodox Churches than you can shake a stick at.

Below are a selection of photos that I took whilst out and about. The full album is available here.

SAM

Busy Busy

There hasn't been many photo opportunities over the last few months, so I've put up some random photos I've taken on my phone just to brighten up the writing!

Scrabble problems

I don't quite know where the time has gone since coming back from Nepal. I've been finishing my turbine selection section of my work, and now have an idea of where I'm going mechanically. I've even submitted a paper to the World Renewable Energy Conference 2011 in Sweden about my selection method and outcomes, as it's not the usual way to select a turbine. Now, I'm modelling the turbine in a bit more detail and looking to see how I can experiment with it. Which comes to one of the frustrations I've reached. I thought I'd be doing a lot more practical experiments, but I suppose you have to do the theory first and come up with some ideas before you can test them. It's not the sitting in labs and fiddling with switches and buttons that I thought it would be. Not yet anyway.

Swappable heads on top of my computer

In PhD-land I've also been reading into the electrical side of things - how grids are made, how generators are connected together, control systems for these and so on. It's meant reaching into the deepest depths of my memory and trying to retrieve my old electrotechnology lectures. This has actually been very interesting, realising why things are done as they are in this world: the choice of 50Hz as a standard frequency in Europe, reading the history of the electrical current wars between direct (constant) advocated by Thomas Edison and alternating with Nikola Tesla and George Westinghouse beating its drum. (To read about the current wars see here). I've also spent some time looking at the National Grid here in the UK, as this can provide ideas on how to operate a remote electrical grid. There's an interesting bit on the BBC about how the National Grid copes (or doesn't as the case may be) with the peak in demand at the end of Eastenders here.

Lights in Bristol city centre

The Welsh translation of microwave - such an onomatopoeic description! From the Centre for Alternative Technology

I've been doing a lot outside uni as well. I've been asked to be Deputy Stage Manager in Horfield Theatre Company's latest production, Bad Girls - the musical. I think it's going to be fun!

I went to the Ashden Awards in London on the 1st July. These are awards for sustainable energy solutions. This year there were some interesting and a wide variety of finalists. I thought it was great to see Okehampton College and St Columb Minor School, as they were spreading the knowledge amongst children, which worked its way back to their homes. The Isle of Eigg in Scotland had formed a remote grid using hydro, wind, solar and diesel which was great.

I spent a long time talking to the MD of Eigg Electric about the operation of their grid. It is a fantastic example of how renewable energy sources can be used to link up and supply communities. Although it would be great to implement similar schemes across the UK, Eigg has several advantages. They are a solid community, with everyone working to the same goal - partly due to their island location. On the mainland this sense of community doesn't really exist as much. They also accept limitations on their power - a maximum of 5kW per household. I think that most consumers wouldn't like the power being cut whilst using their electric shower if someone switched on the kettle. And also the cost of it was very high. Pico and Micro hydro is normally quoted at about $1000 per kW generation (£700/kW). On Eigg, however, the cost was £5440 per kW - and that is including the two 80kW standby diesel generators. I just don't think it's commercially viable still. Soon, hopefully, the price of the technology will reduce and maybe this shining example will be replicated all over the country and the world.

Having a lie down on Bridge Valley Road in the Midnight Walk

Last year Lynne Richards, a most wonderful woman who I had the pleasure of knowing, sadly passed away. St Peter's Hospice in Bristol supported Lynne and her family. St Peter's was organising a Midnight Walk, where women would walk 10 miles around Bristol. It seemed very appropriate to us all, as it would be on the same day that Lynne died last year, so a team of ladies from church was going to attempt it. Not to be out done, a group of men, including me, decided we would support them all by marshalling on the route. I was posted on the closed Bridge Valley Road, and enjoyed watching all the women puffing and panting coming up the road. When we returned to the finish, I regretted my previous smugness as I was tasked in cutting the tags from everyone's sweaty ankle. Karma.

Lynne's Ladies, Me and Jim on Bridge Valley Road

It's strange how things happen, this morning I woke up with an idea. I think it may be the basis of the idea, the idea that is going to push my research into the unknown, which is where I should be heading. It's been exciting trying to write it down to understand how I'm going to accomplish it. It's going to take a long time to develop it properly, but I finally have an idea. Woo.

I'm off to Greece for a couple of weeks now, one of my close friends is getting married. I'm looking forward to the break, sunshine, and a chance to sleep.

For now

SAM

Back to Nepal!

After a little volcano trouble (grrr...) I finally made it back to Nepal, a year and a week to the day after I left. It was strange going back. I really wanted to see my adopted family again. Saru had had a baby boy, Bibek would be a lot bigger, and my Nepali language skills would be put to the test.

I also had some work I wanted to do. They were 3 main things:

1. Visit a project site for pico or micro hydro

2. Go to Kathmandu University at Dhulikhel, where they had a propeller turbine test rig installed.

3. Collect some data on river flow - which would probably mean a trip to a Nepal Government office.

It was weird descending back into the dust bowl of cacophony that is Kathmandu. It had been a year since I was last here. I had spoken some Nepali sporadically, I had tried - and failed - to cook Nepali food, and I had done my best to keep up with the politics (nothing had happened). But sitting in the taxi weaving in and out of the traffic, reminded me how much I really missed the place. Yes, it was noisy. Yes, it was polluted. Yes, it stank. But there were things here that really never failed to touch me. When the taxi pulled up to my adopted Nepali home, I forgot all the chaos around and remembered the joys of Nepal, the warmth of the people, the taste of the food, and the unpredictability of the electricity supply - which disappeared 10 minutes after I arrived.

I spent the first week re-acquainting myself with my old Nepal life. I went to the PEEDA office, and presented them all the T-Shirts I bought in Bristol, with bristolian slang on it (http://www.beast-clothing.com/). It did take some explaining what each meant though. I spent a lot of time with my adopted family. Saru had had a baby boy, less than 1 month old, and now was living at the house for a few months as is traditional in Nepali culture. I visited the International Church, KISC, and met up with my old lunch friends, those left anyway. A great catch up.

Biraj from the PEEDA office arranged for me to visit Krishna Panthee, a hydropower installer that I met in Bhanbhane (see March 2009). Krishna was currently installing a few micro hydro schemes in Ilam. Ilam was somewhere I really wanted to go. It was in the far east of the country, and known for its tea growing (map). There was going to be a strike in a couple of days, and as Ilam was at least a days bus ride from Kathmandu, I took a flight to Jhapa in the eastern Terai, then caught a jeep back up to Ilam bazaar.

In Ilam Bazaar, I met Kumar Shrestra from NCDC (ncdcilam.org.np), an office that operated as the government service centre for micro hydro. He delivered me to my hotel, and then left me to eat dinner. In my room, I had a visit of a local cockroach, a bit of a shock when it decided to climb over me whilst I was sleeping. The next morning, there was a knock on the door. I opened it, and stood there was a small little Nepali man. He smiled at me, came in and sat down. I didn't quite understand what was going on. So, I just started to chat. I found out that his name was Amrit Pandey, and was a resident of the village Krishna was working in. He would deliver me to Ekatappa, where Krishna would meet us.

Amchowk's power house

The destroyed dam site, with the locals clearing the rock

Sitting with the locals in Amchowk

Ekatappa was a 6 hour jeep ride from Ilam Bazaar. The jeep was rather full and uncomfortable. After an hour or so, we started to go off road, bouncing along between the ruts and stones. And as normal, slowly and surely, people disembarked as we reached their villages. By the time we reached Ekatappa at the end of the road, there was only 5 of us left. In Ekatappa, there was Krishna waiting for us. The next week, I went around 3 different micro hydro projects in different states of construction. In Ekatappa, the scheme was just starting to be built, with the base of the intake canal laid. In Amchowk, they were a lot further on. There was a few metres of intake canal to be built, the dam required rebuilding after it was destroyed in floods the previous year, and an extension to the intake canal was being built using penstock pipe. The third was up stream from the Amchowk site. It had been operational for the last 2 years, and was still working well.

The access road down to the power house site

The new intake, with bamboo scaffolding

Installing the transmission lines

I watched the people in Amchowk rebuilding their dam, and talked with them about their aspirations for electricity. Some people wanted TVs, others to charge their mobile phones, but most were just looking forward to clean light. Something that we in the west take very much for granted. In Amchowk, I stayed with the Baskota family, a wonderfully friendly family who welcomed me in with typical Nepali charm.

An old lady from Amchowk

A traditional grinding stone

With the Baskota family daughters and Krishna in Amchowk

At the time I was in Ilam, it was the same time as the UK General Elections. When I woke up the morning after the elections, Nepali radio declared Labour the winners. 2 hours later, the Tories had won an overall majority, by the end of the day the coalition Con-Lib was going to be formed. It was strange listening to UK politics on Nepali radio, another countries take on your so-called democracy. They were in awe of the way we voted. It made me feel a little bit guilty. This was the first election I was going to have voted in, and even this time it was by proxy (thanks Hannah!). But in a country like Nepal, the vote was something that was cherished, that people not one generation back had fought tooth and nail for, and there we were with turnout 65%. It felt pathetic - did we not recognise the importance of our votes?

The strike kept on going. After 5 days, I had seen everything that I wanted to, and really needed to get back to Kathmandu. However, there was no transport. When the strike finally ended after 8 days, the rain started, and the roads became impassible. So, Krishna and I had to wait a couple of days more before returning to Ilam Bazaar. Krishna saw me down to Birtamod in the Terai, from where I caught a bus to Didi's house. The bus ride was fairly uneventful - apart from the goat's backside in my face for a good hour - until I had to change buses. I was to catch a local bus to Lalbandi, which was 45 minutes from the road junction I was stood at. The first bus that pulled up I climbed aboard. It was packed, nothing new for a Nepali bus, but now the heat of the day had really started to kick in. Outside was a balmy 40 degrees, but inside it must have been over 50. There was nowhere to sit down, and I was forced to stand up with my head twisted parallel to the ground, the roof of the bus definitely not made for tall people to stand up in. By the time I fell out of the bus in Lalbandi, I had lost several stones through sweating and my clothes were reduced to towelling.

Bibek, Didi's son, had lived in Kathmandu during my year in Nepal. We went on several adventures together (here and here). But now, he had returned to live with his Mum and Dad in the Terai. I got a lift on a bike from Lalbandi to their village, about 5km away, and saw Didi outside her house working. We chatted for a long time, then I succumbed to the heat and fell asleep upstairs. I was warned about the snakes that would be there. next thing I knew, I was woken by Bibek staring at me shouting 'Sam-mama' (Uncle Sam). Kathmandu didn't seem the same without him, but I was glad he was here. In his village he could play, be with people his own age and do all the things that naughty little boys should do. We spent the next day walking around the village, Bibek showing me the maize that they were just about to cut, the cobra holes and how low the river had got - it was non-existant now, very different from the time I bathed in it with an audience.

After two nights in the heat of the Terai, I returned to Kathmandu, via Samjhu's house in Hetauda. Samjhu had got married just before I left last time (here), and now was the proud mother to a first son, her son was born one day before Saru's. I was really happy to see that Samjhu was looking well and enjoying her married life. Back in Kathmandu I spent my last week with my family. I had named Saru's son Bob, mainly because it was a name that Nepali people would be easily be able to pronounce.

'Bob'

After getting hopelessly lost around Dhulikhel, I went to visit John Cannell at Kathmandu University's Engineering Campus. There, he had set up a full size low head pico hydro test rig, and was conducting experiments on different propeller turbines. It was really interesting to speak with someone who had spent so long in Nepal working as a missionary, trying to build engineering capability, and seeing how he saw the world. I also had the great pleasure of visiting Kathmandu Alternative Power and Energy Group, who were currently running a project to build wind turbines out of locally made material and with local wood carving skills. Rakesh from KAPEG was a proper engineer, ready to turn his hand to anything and a fantastic experimenter. I left Dhuilikhel more inspired to get things up and going with my PhD in the UK.

And as always is the way, far too quickly it was all over again. I found myself packing, and getting ready to go to the airport. As I left, I was sad that I hadn't spent a long time here, a month flies by especially when last time was a whole year, but re-energised with the real life situations that I could put my research into practice with. I now have the task of trying to keep hold of that enthusiasm...

SAM

Easter Holidays

So, for the last few months I've been working on finding a way of selecting a turbine. This has meant going back to basic theory and looking at how turbines work, which has been very useful. It has reminded me of the fun I had in my undergraduate times, we did experiments with Pelton wheels, jets, flow measuring devices and so on. It also has brought some things to attention, why propeller turbines are normally used at low head, the problems with Pelton and Turgo wheels when the jet is slow. Here's some pictures of turbines if you have no idea what is what...

Pelton Wheel

Turgo Wheel

Crossflow

Francis Turbine

Propeller Turbine

Waterwheel

Archimedes Screw

The PhD is in association with Engineers Without Borders - UK (www.ewb-uk.org). So, I joined EWB for their annual research conference at the Royal Academy of Engineering in London, where I presented a poster about my research. The poster didn't say too much about the solution of my research problems, but I think describes the problem quite well. It was interesting to listen to the other EWB researchers, what they were up to, their motivations and so on, and also see who was up to anything hydro-like.

EWB Poster

This term, I've helped out in my first undergraduate lab. My supervisor was doing a series of lectures on Electrical Product Design, and part of this included a lab on designing a solar powered motor - the product itself wasn't the most useful, the process is the important part. So I helped out in the lab. I was rather scared, as I still really hadn't done much practical electronics apart from building the SMPS (see last time's blog), and I knew they would ask questions that I couldn't answer. But, it wasn't too bad, I managed to answer most things, and with the help of George, my lab-mate, we survived.

I had an afternoon out in Bristol with a friend, which as many people know is the home of the engineering genius Brunel. I met the man himself at his iron ship, the SS Great Britain.

Brunel and Me (yes, I needed a haircut)

I've also booked my tickets to go back to Nepal again. I'm going to arrive there exactly one year after leaving last time, 16th April, which is a bit of a coincidence. I'm really looking forward to seeing all my friends there and just having a relax. The plan is to do a bit of research into small scale hydro as well. I'm very very excited.

For now

SAM