Earlier this summer, I attended a two-week pre-college program at Brown University enrolled in a fluid mechanics class. The main project for this class: design and build a functioning remote-controlled “hovercraft” and pit it against the rest of the class, in an ultimate test of speed and control.
Having never experimented with RC technology before, I found the experience truly exciting. I was reminded of an after school program that I attended as a 3rd grade student–we built robots out of LEGO sets–that was led by a high school student who went on to attend the University of Pennsylvania. I thought, “why not do the same, but with this captivating new hovercraft project?”
I began drafting a proposal for a junior high after-school program shortly after, which intended to teach students about the basic physics of moving objects and was centered around building RC hovercrafts. The proposal included a list of required materials, and, of course, in order to verify that all the materials are correct, I needed to build a prototype hovercraft over the summer before the program began.
It wasn’t the building of the actual hovercraft that proved challenging–the hot glue I used was terrible, but that’s besides the point–rather, it was the electrical logistics that I needed to think through that was the root cause of many stressful summer afternoons.
In particular, connecting the wires on the brushless fans to those on the electronic speed controllers (ESCs) was something I struggled with quite a bit. It wasn’t required of us when we were working on the Brown project (the teacher had taken care of it beforehand) so I simply hadn’t taken it into consideration when I started building the prototype.
I tried everything: duct tape, crimping the wire, even using electrically-conductive glue; but as soon as any of these started working, it would break down minutes later. In other words, all of the methods I tried were simply too unreliable to act as a proper solution.
As several YouTube tutorials seemed to convey, soldering the wires–using a searing-hot iron to melt a metallic substance into a sort of adhesive goo–was the proper solution. What all of these tutorials lacked was how the wires needed to be soldered together: no instructional videos existed which I could use to solve my dilemma.
On the afternoon of August 25th, with the supervision of my nervous mom, I attempted, with no experience and no clear guidance, to droop solder onto the connection point between the fan and ESC wire. It was pointless. Again and again, the solder resolidified before I could make the connection; at one point, the tip of the solder coil even got stuck in the bullet connector I was using.
Frustrated, I pounded the off switch on the soldering iron, marched into my bedroom, shut the door, and crashed on my bed. What was I supposed to do now? I already submitted the flyer for my after school program; if I don’t figure out something before then, all of my planning and ambition would be for naught. What else was there to try?
My mom came into my room and sat on my bed. “Don’t worry,” she said. “There must be some old guy, who’s seen and done it all, sitting behind a dusty counter in a dark hardware store somewhere who can help us. No matter what it takes, I know you’ll get that hovercraft to work.”
The next day we drove to Cooper Electric, an electrical store which, like she said, sat on a dark road in Sunset Park underneath a clanky and rusting BQE overpass. The store was practically empty; the only worker we saw was a young store clerk who didn’t look very knowledgeable about electrical engineering.
We showed him the connection we were trying to make. “What an electrician would probably do,” he said, “is expose part of the two wires, twist them together, and hold them in place with a wire nut.”
“Wire nut?” Mom said. “What is a wire nut?”
He pointed to a red box sitting on a nearby shelf. Inside were about fifty yellow plastic devices, each with a metal coil inside.
“Do you think that would work?” Mom asked me.
“We can try,” I shrugged. I was still very much doubting this would work.
So we bought the box of wire nuts and a roll of brown electrical tape (he said connecting the wires with duct tape posed the risk of electrical shock) and started home.
That afternoon, after four dog walks and six classical music videos of procrastination, I stripped the wires I needed to connect, tied them together, placed a wire nut on top of them, and tentatively nudged the joystick on the transmitter.
The fan whirred to life.
I had found a reliable alternative to a problem that had only one conventional solution.
It’s been four months since finally completing my hovercraft prototype, and the wire nuts have yet to fail their purpose. I have since begun my after-school program with a small group of 9 sixth-grade students, and I am elated to see that they are really involved in this new project–one even called it their new favorite class in school.
But what I’m most excited to see is that they, too, are encountering issues with their design, considering how to solve these issues, and implementing their solutions with no time wasted. Although these obstacles range in complexity and importance–whether it be creating more space between the rudder servo and the thrust fan, or nearly burning the classroom down by attaching the fan directly into the battery–they are quickly and efficiently moving past them nonetheless.
Even if they never go on to pursue careers in engineering, I’m at least glad that they are realizing these problem-solving skills so early in their educations, and that such simple devices as wire nuts could be part of the knowledge they’re acquiring.