Sustainable Water Feature
‘Learning Beyond the Classroom’
For my A level project I was asked by the Filby in Bloom committee to design and manufacture a
water feature that would celebrate the success of the Village.
The beginning of any products life has to start with design, and so I needed to discuss with my
client what the village would like, he didn’t really know and gave me a free reign (which was great
as I could then come up with lots of ideas) although he did specify that they would like it to have a
environmental and sustainable element. Adrian my client and I decided that it would be good if
the water feature could become the new centre piece (of floral arrangement) for the village and
illustrate their achievement.
To get an idea of water feature designs, I did research looking at what is on the market at the
moment. I visited various shops and garden centres that sell them, to get the best representative,
as well as design I needed to think of the manufacturing processes that I could use, I discovered
that most of the products had been cast.
I came up with many different designs from traditional to more contemporary. I really wanted to
emphases what I believed to be the theme of the village: flowers, so some of the designs followed
this.
From this page of designs, I had to choose three solutions that I believed were the best; from
these solutions my client would make the final decision.
I needed to look at a power supply and materials, I thought that it would be great to incorporated
the sustainable element in here, so I did research looking into renewable energy sources and
material that are environmentally friendly, there were many ideas but I thought the easiest way of
doing this would be using either wind or solar power or I could use recycled and reclaimed
materials.
Figure 1 Initial ideas.
These are my three final solutions:
1. Pyramid design, made from sheet stainless steel, water would come out of small holes on
the surface and flow over the top – waterfall effect. The power system would be a wind
turbine attached to the top of the pyramid.
2. Writing saying FILBY IN BLOOM, water would be pumped up through the letters and it
would flow over the surface of each letter. Would use recycled aluminium cans.
3. More traditional design- tiered water feature, water pumped up the middle and out and
over the tiers. Each tier would be a photovoltaic cell that would produce power for the
pump.
My client preferred solution 2, (word design), as well as using reclaimed materials, to make it
more sustainable I thought the pump be powered by a wind turbine.
With the original design process finished, I needed to move onto development. Development
started in the case of CAD (computer aided design) models. I started designing using SolidWorks
lettering; I originally wanted the words to flow and appear to be joined up. However this was more
difficult than it looked and letters were to thin, there was a problem that they would break during
casting and it was difficult to recognise the bend in the pipe work and so couldn’t be easily read
so the design was changed to block letters, using a more formal font that could be understood
easily. This also meant that all the letters would be the same width.
The second decision was whether each word would be cast separately or all together. I created
designs and consulted experts and my client, I decided that it would be better to cast the letters
as three separate words.
Figure 2 Solidworks design of the final solution.
So, to pump water through the letters, I needed to place internal pipes that the water could run
through. I originally thought using copper plumbing pipe would be the best a it bends easily,
however when testing this the pipe actually melted inside the aluminium, as this didn’t work I
redesigned the model, so that the pipe could be put in place after casting – split cast part,
however once I had designed the CAD drawing I decided that it might be easier to change the
material of the pipe and cast with the pipes in place, so I consulted Thurton foundry who told me
that it would be ok to use stainless steel pipes that could be cast in place.
The internal pipes were bent at a 90 degree angle; they came out of the top of each letter.
Before casting the actual words I did a test piece at school, I have problems with removing the
pattern as the draft angle wasn’t big enough and so the compacted sand cracked. The sand is
different to what I was going to use at Thurton so this would not happen to the proper castings.
To produce the pattern, I used the CAD model, which was transferred onto ‘Modella’ software
(schools CNC lathe), in which it was cut out on Urethane board. The actual patterns of FILBY and
BLOOM were cut out at Thurton Foundry as they had a larger bed size although I cut out the IN
on the school’s machine.
The following pictures show the process of me preparing the pattern and sand casting in school.
Figure 3 CNC Machining the Pattern.
Figure 4 Using the pattern to create a cavity in the cope and drag.
Figure 5 Using a crucible to melt recycled aluminium cans from a local collection point.
Figure 6 The letter ‘F’ used as a test piece.
Casting at a Industrial Foundry – Thurton Foundry
The sand they used was mixed with resin so that it hardened and set quickly. It was fed through
using pipes that went into a continuous mixer; this constantly combined the material together.
Using the mixed sand from the holding pipe, I filled the box with sand, firmly spreading and
packing it down with my hands until the box was filled to the top. Next the second box (cope) was
put on top, the pipes were put into the holes previously made, and this was done so that there
was exact location of the water pipes. I then had to place the runner and riser in the correct
position. The runner is to pour molten metal into the casting and the riser is for the air to escape,
when the metal comes out of the riser I knew that the casting was full. The box was filled with
more sand; I had to be careful not to move the pipes. Once full and compacted, the two parts
were taken apart.
Figure 7 The Filby pattern in the large cope at Thurton Foundry
Once apart I had to take the pattern out of the sand, this has to be done with great care so that
the sand doesn’t move or any particles fall into the mould.
Figure 8 Cavity produced by the removal of the pattern
In order to place the water pipes in the mould, they were placed in the top casting box and
pushed through until they came out of the top of the box. The pipes were fixed in place using
wooden pegs. The boxes were put back together and cramped and glued and the metal was
poured into the casting, for health and safety reasons I couldn’t pour the metal myself because it
was dangerous.
Figure 9 Cope and drag ready for casting
The materials, you would think it would be easy to collect cans, but I nearly had to raid the bins at
school however thankfully the CANMAN donated the 16kg of crushed aluminium cans to the
project that were all collected in the local area.
Figure 10 16KG of locally collected recycled aluminium cans
Once I cast them at Thurton, they were fettled, they were very rough and had a lot of excess
aluminium on them, so before they could be taken to Colorcote for the spray coat of
polyurethane, I had to clean them by hand, it took me two full days during the Easter holidays at
school, filing down the sides.
The castings were then sent to ColorCote in Hethel, next to Lotus Cars. They are a specialist
company who use a powder coating process. The words were coated in polyurethane to stop
degradation from the continuous water flow.
Whilst the castings were at ColorCote, I produced the designs for the backing and brackets that
were going to be produced by me with some assistance from Macklow Engineering Ltd in
Salhouse Norwich. Both pieces were produced from a Stainless steel sheet and cut out on a
punch and die machine.
Figure 11 Punch and die machine at Macklow Engineering Ltd.
Figure 12 Nibbled out stainless steel brackets design and manufactured to support the metal
flowers
A dxf file taken from our CAD package - Solidworks and then inputted into the punch and die
machine and cut out, the sides were bent and folded into shape, this was achieved using a metal
bender.
On the F and the M of the casting, I produced flowers, made from stainless steel. Macklow
Engineering Ltd taught me how to make flowers from sheet stainless steel, that were cut out on a
punch and die machine using a template, the pieces were them bent around a former in order to
shape the metal petals and leaves, the stem was solid round stock which had I had to thread a
hole in so that I could connect the flower head to the stem. The leaves were then welded to the
stem. This taught me how to use simple manual skills in batch production rather that everything
being fully automated unlike the rest of the production.
Once I had got all the parts back, I had to assemble them; I created a template against the
backing sheet, with indications to where I needed to drill holes for the pipes and the brackets.
These were all connected using nuts and bolts.
So the product was done, however it didn’t work yet, as I needed to plumb it in.
I connected the stainless steel pipes to copper pipes and created a manifold with pipes coming
out in every direction, I could finally test it properly, although I needed to tighten a few
compression fittings, it worked first time. I cast long weights, to secure the base so it can now
stand on its own. The water pump can be connected to a wind turbine generator to make it
energy efficient and reduce its carbon foot print.
Figure 13 The final unit on display at our school on industry day.
The unit will be officially opened by the Mayor of Great Yarmouth on Monday July 7 th 2008 in
Filby.
By Eleanor Beattie
Student at the Prestigious Langley Independent School,
Centre of Excellence in Design, Technology, Engineering and Manufacturing,
Loddon,
Norfolk.
A special thank you to the following company’s who supported this project:Thurton Foundry
Macklow Engineering Ltd
Colorcote
The Canman
Filby in Bloom Committee