Engineering in Classical Rome

A couple terms ago, as an elective, I took a course on Roman Art & Archaeology. The course as a whole was very interesting but one small aspect of the course really caught my attention. One of the items that we discussed was Roman aqueducts.

Historically, cities always had to be located close to a body of water because all humans need water to survive. This really limited where cities could be located. Before the classical period, there was no way to transport water across long distances (think about how heavy water is!) but in ancient Rome they engineered a system for transporting water across great distances using aqueducts.

Aqueducts were large structures that spanned great distances at a very slight angle. These aqueducts connected large bodies of water to remote city locations and used gravity to maintain a continuous flow of water into the city. Some aqueducts even ran through mountains – the engineers would tunnel through the mountain from each side and meet in the middle. This required incredible precision and is an amazing engineering feat!

When the aqueducts reached the city, the water was then directed into the homes and fountains of the city and for the first time in history, people had the luxury of running water into their homes!

It is really interesting to reflect on how much engineering has impacted the world – imagine life without something as fundamental as running water.

Final thoughts – what is yet to be invented that 2000 years from now will be considered as fundamental as running water?

It's Just Rocket Science!

In high school physics class, students learn how to calculate the speed and acceleration caused by forces acting on an object and the forces that occur when objects interact with one another. But what happens when you have a constant stream of fluid on an object? How can you calculate and analyze the force applied by a fluid?

The answer is through the study of Fluid Mechanics. It was my favourite course last term. I think it is really cool to be able to analyze the pressure and forces that a fluid will exert on an object and it is useful for so many different applications!

Fluid mechanics is used in the design of the following:

-Rocket Science – It is a knowledge of fluid mechanics that allows engineers to design rockets. They need to determine how much gas must be produced through combustion to propel the rocket at the acceleration that it needs.

-Aerodynamics of cars – The shape of a car can drastically change its performance. Cars are designed to allow the air to flow smoothly across them without creating too much drag (which really slows cars down). A car without much drag is much more fuel efficient – so this is pretty important!

- Environmental water systems such as dams – A dam has to be built to be strong enough to support the weight of the water it holds, so it is really important to be able to calculate how much force the water will exert on the dam

-Air planes – What makes a plane fly? Fluid Mechanics! The shape of planes’ wings are designed so that when the air passes around them, more force is exerted on the bottom of the wing and this pushes the whole plane upwards. Without a knowledge of fluid mechanics we definitely wouldn’t have the amazing huge planes that we have today.

As you can see, fluid mechanics has a lot of important applications, which makes it pretty interesting. Plus, it's pretty cool to be able to say that you really are studying rocket science!

Co-op Term on Campus

I am currently on a co-op work term, working on campus with a professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Working on campus is great. I did not have to suffer the trauma of traveling somewhere unheard of and I already know the bus route.

My boss has a contract with the Ministry of Transportation of Ontario (MTO) that involves predicting rainfall patterns throughout the province. The MTO is concerned with rainfall information because it would help them to design highways to handle the rainfall at a given location. Highways span the entire province, not just in cities areas where weather stations provide local data. Finding a suitable method of predicting rainfall patterns between stations is the objective of the contract. The challenge is that weather stations are so inconsistantly distributed. The stations are almost exclusively located in southern Ontario. This makes it difficult to predict rainfall in the northern parts of the province. The project involved an interim report, which will be my work report after a few tune-ups. It has also encouraged me to develop my computer skills emmensly. I did not know there was so much that I did not know.

Working in the faculty is a great experience. I have hands on experience with cutting edge research! Seeing the faculty from the inside changed my entire preception of universities. There is so much more that goes on than I knew about. Class is clearly not the highest priority, but it is all that a first year student sees. There is so much more after an undergraduate degree, so much fullfillment and so many applications. There is so much passion in the faculty. Everyone loves what they do, they would not have a PhD in it if they didn't. It is inspiring; it makes me want to learn!

My boss was teaching a graduate class this past term. It was very interesting to see such advanced applications of Civil Engineering, but also to see classes from the instructors perspective. He also manages all of the work reports for the faculty, actually his co-op (me) does this. It was nice to get so many tips on report writing from the guy who controls them.

Design of a Culvert Crossing

I am a current first year environmental engineering student. The final project for our 'Introduction to Civil & Environmental Engineering' course involved the predesign of a culvert crossing on campus. A culvert is a tunnel that allows water to pass through. They are often used to allow water to pass under roadways.

Currently there is a by-pass channel (flowing body of water) on campus. There is a crossing with two steel culverts that allows water to flow under the crossing. The project was to develop a more advanced culvert system that would be able to handle a greater amount and speed of water. The replacement culvert was to be designed to stand up to a hundred year storm. A hundred year storm is the largest storm that would be expected to occur in the area within a hundred year period.

We spent hours outside surveying the site. We recorded the elevations of the land around the channel and even put on waders and surveyed through the channel. We recorded the distance between all points so that they could accurately be plotted on an AutoCAD map.

Once the data were collected we created a map of the area, and developed a design for a replacement culvert. We had to consider the quantity and speed of water from a hundred year storm.

The project was very open ended. It was up to us to specify the finer details of the proposed crossing. We had the option of designing a sidewalk and guardrail if we thought it was necessary and we had to determine a suitable road width based on how much traffic the site sees. We had to compare the efficiency of 5 different culvert diameters and the number of culverts was completely up to us.

Ultimately, the design that I proposed included 6 culverts, each having a 1.2 meter diameter.

Through the experience, we all developed our surveying and autocad skills, and learned about report writing.