Evaluation Of My Completed Design

Evaluation Of My Completed Design


My completed solar light differs a lot to my original design created on macromedia freehand .to get ideas for my design we went on a field trip around Wellington city to see the lights that were planted around the city. To my amazement there were a lot of different designs. We drew sketches of the designs that we liked. Out of all of the designs I drew, there was one particular idea that appealed to me. This was a light that was wall mounted. I didn’t like the actual design of the light but the fact that it was wall mounted inspired me to create a wall mountable solar light.

On freehand I came up with the original design. It was simple. Then I made the design on solid works. Making the light on solidworks was a great experience because I got to see the flaws on my design. A major flaw solidworks alerted me of was that having the solar panel where it was a bit impractical .i discussed this problem with my teacher terry advised me to add more solar panels on to the top of my light .This way my light would be gaining optimum sunlight and also gaining more power because I would have 4 solar panels instead of just one. So I created my new modified design on solidworks

I then began to make my mockup of my final design. The mockup was easily made because of the simplicity of my design. I was happy with my mock up because it was a good size. Everything was going to plan.

Then on the computer I made the net of my aluminium base. Then I encountered another problem. The net was much too large to fit into the Roland cam machine. So I decided to make my final design a bit smaller and it would only fit three solar panels on it.

So the net was cut out in the cam machine. I got the cam machine t not only cut out the net but I also got it to cut grooves on the lines where the net would be folded. I did this so the folds would be perfect and easy to do. After the net was folded I decided that it would not need brackets because the net held its shape without any aid and brackets would make it look less simple.

I made the top plastic part. I would make this by using the vacuum former. I made the mould of wood. In my original free hand design the plastic top part was curved. this was a problem as the mould was going to be too hard and time consuming to make with a curve so I changed the shape of it.

I then made three circuits. I had a problem with the circuits. the tracking had fallen off the circuits in some parts. I fixed this by adding solder were the tracking originally was .All three of the circuits worked. I added two higher powered Leeds in parallel to each circuit. The circuits produce good light.

Then I siliconed the box where the brackets would have been so the box wont let any water into it. Then I added the solar panels to the top of the box. Then I connected the solar panels to the circuits. I had a really good idea instead of just sealing the box shut with silicon which would have looked messy I cut out a bit of whie plastic and drilled six holes in it for the LEDs.I used white plastic so that the circuitry would not be visible.It looks real good.

I am very happy with the way my final design came out. It has been a long process but I have learned much from it. I think my design is very cool not only because it looks cool but the fact it can easily be wall mounted or kept on the ground is a bonus. I don’t think if I made it again I would not make any changes.

By Chirag Patel 11DTM, 11HST