Design Discussions

The information listed below are the minutes recorded by Alex Moix.  These minutes are recorded in the weekly Skype meetings that our Project Ambassador, Harrison Laws, and Project Co - Ambassador, Alex Moix, hold with the Ben Marts.  Ben Marts has worked on the design plans for the project since day one.  These meetings are crucial for the AEA team in finishing the project.  Ben Marts will be finishing the Water Tower Design and sending the plans out for bid from the contractor that we are in contact with in Belize.  Once the tower is completed we will be able send some of our team back to complete the project in its entirety by designing and completing a piping network that will run from the water tower to the church and to the school.  The following minutes go through the exchange of information and planning processes the team talks about in the weekly Skype meetings.  Meetings are held every Monday and we will try and post the minutes accordingly the following Tuesdays.

Any questions of concerns about the project please feel free to email our group at Arkansas.Engineers.Abroad@gmail.com where all of our officers will be able to access the account and will be able to get your questions answered quickly.

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4/9/2012 – Skype meeting with Ben Marts



·         Piping Trip

o   Ben is going to see if we can get hired hands

§  Shouldn’t have to worry about finding workers

o   Need to figure out how deep to dig the trenches for pipes

o   There is a 2ft elevation change from the tower location to the faucet location

o   Shutoff valve at base of tower (lockable)

o   Calculate head loss for connection joints

o   Run pipe down the structural membrane of tower

o   Ben is not going on piping trip

·         Ben is okay with having his full name on the blog

·         Ben bought plane tickets through Cheryl Nimmo

o   Kim needs to talk to her

o   She is the Civil Engineering financial person

o   Also need to talk to the lady in the Dean’s office

        o   Talk to media coordinator for Bell (Camilla Medders)

§  She can advertise for us

§  Located near the stairs by Dean’s office

·         Think about getting a Media Chair

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4/2/2012 – Skype meeting with Ben Marts


·         Good news

o   Working on connections for tower design

o   Numbers are good on Ben’s part

o   Ben is going to talk to a structural engineer on the 4th

·         EIA – Engineers in Action

o   A logistics group

o   2 potential projects

o   Are a little overwhelmed

o   Could be very helpful but we have to pay them for their services

o   Have contacts

o   Ben thinks we should stick with Belize for a while because we know the country

·         Get everything out of Ben’s dropbox

o   Make AEA dropbox or use Google docs

·         In-water pump

o   Pump will shut off when water lowers to prevent picking up sediment

o   Floating pump

o   Needs to be between 1 and 2 hp

o   Get Chelsea to finish pump designs

§  Get her to make a summary of what she has done

§  Need flow from pump, power for pump, and electricity/hour

·         Ben will have work to get checked out by Friday

·         Piping Trip

o   May 12-18

o   Costs

§  Living + food = $30/day

§  Gas

§  Rental vehicle?

§  Hiring locals = $30/day/person

§  Tip Henyo

o   Send Ben an email with dates we want to come and our float dates

o   Talk to Sheryl about insurance

o   Get drawing of map and piping layout

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03/26/12 skype with Ben and meeting with Megan


o   Megan’s contacts

·         Mozambique, Africa

§  Fully integrated farm

§  She will have details after this summer

·         Dangriga, Belize

§  Megan will email her people for details

o   Piping

·         Need piping design done in 2 to 3 weeks to see if parts are in stores

·         CPVC or PVC

§  Need to paint it (sunlight affects it)

·         Count on 25 feet of head

·         Ask Rand where faucet should be on church

·         Can get estimated cost for pipes by multiplying Home Depot’s prices by two

·         Give list of materials needed to Randy within 3 weeks before trip

·         Add 10% to the length of pipe we think we will need

·         2” pipe is max

o    Ben has tower design 85% done and will be finished within 2 weeks

o   water tank will be about 10,000L

·         usually have an outlet

·         if we have to drill a hole for piping it needs to be a foot from the bottom

o   plan on buying picks and shovels

o   Ben will look into contractors in the next 2 weeks



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Skype with Ben:  March 12, 2012

·         Piping trip:  May 12 or 13, 2012

o   Plan for 6 days

o   Minimum of 2 days if we have a trench digger

·         Coordinates of More Tomorrow

o   17.34857, -88.69487

·         Piping Designs

o   Head from tower = 10.5ft

o   Base height = 24ft

o   Assume low velocity

o   Well is next to tower

o   Ben is looking at designing a taller tower

o   Need to figure out max length of pipeline

o   Make a circle around the tower based on the above length

o   Distribution from tower

o   May only need 1ft of head at faucets (1psi)

§  Talk to Dr. Sorrens to see if this is good

o   Water is going to school, church, NE and SW from school

·         Figure out total gallons of water used per day in the village

o   10gal/person

·         Need to figure out logistics on getting a truck to drill the well

·         Ben is going to get more information on Bolivia trip

·         We will need to run structural designs through Randy and he will send them to one of the PE’s in Belize to get checked

·         Shower next to tower?

·         Do field tests to see if pipe will break when driving over it at certain depths

·         What Ben would like to see done:

o   11X17 map of city

§  draw pipeline

o   Set up excel sheet with had losses

o   Figure out pipe size so Ben can send info to contractors

o   Ben can help on things after Friday

o   Ben should have structural design done in next couple of weeks (would like to see it completed by first week of April)

·         What we want to get done in 2 weeks:

o   Piping design

o   Plane tickets?

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