Project Title: Hydrogen Fuel Cell For Motorcycle

Author: Blace Jacobus

Class Code: IE 655
Date: 10/15/16
eLearning Pack ID: IE655-FALL 2016-33-27
Collaborative Companies:
1)
2)
3)
4)

Harley-Davidson (Motorcycle Company)

CEP Life Cycle Assessment (Chemical Engineering Progress)
iWWD (Industrial Water & Waste Digest)
LaVision Automotive (Measurement Technologies for Automotive)

Customer Requirements
IMG_1122: From this image it appears the customer was looking for boat propeller. It
looks like this propeller in particular is well used by the corrosion and chipping on
the edges of the blades. I would say this is a good product since it is clearly aged
and has minimal signs of degradation. This means the product is very strong and
corrosion resistant. One thing that cannot be noted from this picture that would be a
big customer requirement is how efficient the shape of the blades is.
IMG_1123: Unlike the last boat component this one does not seem to be as well
designed. For boat components the designer should know it will be subject to very
harsh environments in terms of corrosion so resistant materials should be a key
factor in the design as well as testing for corrosion of the finished product. It is a
shame because most of the product appears to be made from corrosion resistant
materials except for the bolts. I would assume the bolts are the cheapest part of this
assembly and should have been slightly upgraded to prevent this from occurring.
IMG_1148: This appears to be paint peeling on a house. If a customer knew the
paint would peal from the siding like this they surely would not have bought the
product and will never buy it again. It looks like it did not adhere well to the nail
heads and the peel propagated from there. As a designer it should be know that for
wood surfaces metal fastness will be used and the paint should be made to handle
it.
IMG_1150: When buying an expensive boat a customer would expect higher quality
materials to be used that can withstand the elements for the lifetime of the boat. It
would be disappointing to find that the wood that makes the hull and keeps the boat
a float is rotting out from underneath the user!

IMG_1151: This looks like a zoomed in picture of IMG_1150 and it looks even worse
for the wood. It is clearly rotting and not just from collision damage. It looks like
they had to put a lot of screws in just to keep the boards from popping off and they
didnt even repaint it to help slow the corrosion.
IMG_1157: The customer expectations of a docking area would be very demanding.
The design of the harbor would have to accommodate a wide range of boats wile
packing in as many boats as they can to maximize cost but not so much the users
hit each others boats will enter or exiting. The dock design must also accommodate
a varying water level height but be secure so nothing comes loose during harsh
weather.
IMG_1158: A sail boat has some demanding challenges and must make
compromises for every component used. The Boat must have a large sail to catch
as mush wind as possible but also must be as light as possible to reduce the drag in
the water. The big compromise must come in when selecting components to be
used. The designer must select a perfect balance of light weight and strength to
make the best product possible.
IMG_1159: The composter of boats like this would be more focused on reliability and
ease of use. I would assume the owner of this boat is just going out for a weekend
curse and wants the boat to start up and run without any issues. Nothing would
crush a fun filled weekend more if the boat doesnt start!
IMG_1171 Tthis looks like a well-used motor. With the age of the motor taken into
account it looks like it served the test of time in a very harsh environment for metal
components. I see only one very corroded part and thats the Y-Tube but that was
most likely not from the engine manufacture so they cannot held accountable but
the customer should have selected a better Y-tube so it does not get rust into he
engine and damage the internals.
IMG_1172: I am not sure what these parts are used for but they look like very strong
components designed to handle high stress environments. I do not see any cracking
so it appears they did the job.
IMG_1174: Looks like the same components from the previous image. It looks like
the parts in the back are far older than the ones up close because of the rusting.
The rust only seems to be near the openings. This is concerning because any fluid
or air flowing through the openings could be carrying rust ships to the internals of
some machinery. These areas should have extra protections against this very thing.
Taguchi Results:
After preforming the Taguchi calculations it has been determined that the best
configuration of controllable variables is an operating speed optimized for 2 (40
MPH), material 2 (AeroGlide), geometry 2.

CORA Results:
After reviewing the results from the CORA data sheet I can see my product is not a
show stopper product that I had hoped it would be compared to all of the
completers. As discouraging as that is, this tool allows me to see where my product
is lacking and it gives me clear cut data points where to improve. In my situation I
am lacking in the Regenerative Breaking category and will have to invest
resources into that area to insure my product improves. I can then dive deeper and
see that the maintenance of my breaks is very low and would be low hanging fruit in
terms of increasing the value of the breaking category. To test this I can change
some value in this column and see what has the greatest effect. In my case it would
be more beneficial to raise the value of my efficiency my one point than the
maintenance category by 2 and that is because of the weighted importance rating.
If I follow the table to the right I can see that my product excels in efficiency but
needs work in engineering and manufacturing.
I can than follow these categories to the right and see what is bring me down
in customer requirements. In the case of engineering cost I see the fuel cell
engineering and manufacturing is a high cost but I would find that acceptable
because we want a near perfect power source to start our project off of. Since my
manufacturing cost is high I would have to have a higher overall product cost than
my completers resulting in unhappy customers. I now know I want to explore
alternate manufacturing methods to achieve a lower cost without harming the
quality of other categories.
It is cool to see how slight changes in the values of particular fields have
little change on the overall performance of the category as a whole. It is a collective
stack up those results in a weighted overall evaluation of my products performance
in each category. This will allow me to finely tune where I spend the resources of my
company to ensure the success of my product.