The Mix Design Team is finishing up their third set of mix combinations. They have been analyzing their cubes to find concrete compressive strength and specific weight. Recently, one of their cubes reached a compressive strength of 1.4 ksi which is more than enough for the canoe. They will be able to add more admixtures to lessen the strength a but make the mix more floatable. TCNJ Trition is one step closer to choosing their final mixes.

After exploring many options, the Hull Design team has decided to use BearBoatSP as a software to design our canoe. The team has done extensive research on potential shapes and features and has made some decisions up to this point, for example to use a shallow arch hull design. The team also began running example canoe designs with different lengths and dimensions on BearBoatSP. The team will further consider the possible combinations of features and dimensions to ultimately produce the best design.

Megan and Mickey have been hard at work with the mix design over this past month. They have acquired a desired list of materials to begin testing different mixes. Megan and Mickey have decided to make the canoe out of two different mixes, one in the inside for support and one on the outside to act as a waterproof layer.  Currently, the mix design team is testing the effects of new materials (using cubes) on basic mixes in order to determine if these new materials should be considered for the final mix used for the canoe.

The mix design team has been working on finalizing a list of materials. Through literature research and the review of the rules and regulations, the mix is going to consist of Portland cement, cenosophere and Poraver aggregates to increase the strength and decrease the density, and addmixtures to increase the air content and workability. There are other materials we plan to research in the upcoming weeks in order to begin the creation of our concrete canoe mix.

The hull design team has been doing extensive research regarding the type of software we will be using for the design of our canoe. In the past the team has used Maxsurf, but we decided to explore other options after receiving feedback on it. It turns out there are many programs capable of doing this type of work whether they are specifically for boat design or they are general design programs that reference marine applications. We are currently exploring BearboatSP and FreeShip programs. A final decision will be made on the software after we compare the accuracy, capabilities, and efficiency of the two programs. Stay tuned for the big reveal!

Anthony, Charlotte, Megan, Raquel, and Mickey are planning on competing in the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Concrete Canoe competition in April 2018. The competition will also be our senior project for the Civil Engineering department at TCNJ. After attending last year’s regional competition, we have decided what qualities the canoe will need to be more successful than last year’s team (Who received a well-deserved 3rd place overall). We witnessed a few boats fail and many others succeed. Based on our initial judgement we have decided on some great design choices that are unfortunately extremely expensive in material and fabrication cost. WE WANT TO WIN and in order to do so we will need to put in a lot of money, engineering, and hard work. Please support us by donating and sharing.

Message the team privately if you would like to help out.

Congratulations to last years Concrete Canoe team on winning third place overall in the National Competition. This years group has learned a lot from the upper classmen and  looks forward to carrying on the legacy of the TCNJ Torpedo.