Week 8 Update

We are 80 percent of the way there and only have 20 percent to go.  When looking at the top of the cliff from the very bottom eight weeks ago, it looked like we would never be able to climb to the top. But we are so close to reaching the top of the wall and ringing the bell if we just reach the right footholds and handholds.  The handholds at the beginning of the week were creating a cost analysis of the kite, cutting off the excess material of the kite, working on the final presentation and design brief, and learning how to the fly the kite.  We managed to begin the cost analysis of the kite this week, cut off the excess material, and start on the final presentation.  We also received our score on the first draft of the design brief.

One of the first tasks we worked on this week was the cost analysis.  We began by making a tally of what we purchased and how much we paid for each item.  We then created an Excel sheet that we were able to input the quantity used of each material, and then the cost of the materials used was calculated.  Table 1 below shows the data from the cost analysis.  This shows that we spent $54.50 on the project and the kite costs $13.62 to build.  We hope to be able to use this data in the future to calculate how much it would cost to mass produce the kite.  Fortunately, we did not have to pay for shipping since Daniel has Amazon Prime.

Table 1 - Cost Analysis

Material	Quantity Purchased	Units	Total Price of all Material	Cost	Per	Quantity Used	Cost of Materials Used
2 mm Carbon Fiber Rods	5	m	$13.95	$2.79	m	2.9	$8.09
ABS Plastic	225	g	$15.00	$0.07	g	18.62	$1.24
Gorilla Tape	1.524	m	$12.99	$8.52	m	0.18	$1.53
Line	121.92	m	$3.56	$0.03	m	20	$0.58
Nylon	1.393	m^2	$8.95	$6.42	m^2	0.33	$2.12
Washer	1	washer	$0.05	$0.05	washer	1	$0.05
		Total Price	$54.50			Total Price	$13.62

Although he was sick this week, Neil was able to begin to work on the slides for the final presentation.  While we do not have much for the slides yet, having the basic framework of the presentation is a good start.  Finishing the presentation is something that has to be completed in the next week.

In the past week, we were able to make small modifications to the kite as well.  We were able to reinforce the connection points of the kite by adding a drop of superglue in each connector to hold the rods in place.  We also decided to cut off the extra material on the nose of the kite, which has led to a more aerodynamic and balanced kite.

Another important thing was that we were able to view our grade on the final design brief and the comments we received from our instructors.  We feel that we are in a good place with the design brief and scored high marks in all but one category for the most part.  The one category that we plan to really push on as we create our final draft, because we got the lowest score on it, was our lack of discussion and technical activities.  If we were to improve these greatly, it could boost our final report almost an entire letter grade.  Another thing that lost us a lot of points was our spelling and grammar.  The easiest fix we can think of for this is just to actually proofread the report before submitting it.

We have one more week until we have to be prepared for our final presentation, which is June 6th in the Innovation Studio.  This week, we managed to do a lot in beginning to prep for the presentation, but we still have a lot to do.  Now that we have a template of the presentation, we have to fill it out and add the information.  We also have to modify the design brief draft, so we can submit our final version and get as high of a grade as possible.  Lastly, we have to decide who is flying the kite, since Neil has gotten pretty good at flying it, along with Daniel.  Once this stuff is done, we will hopefully be able to stick our arm out and ring that bell at the top of the wall.