Re-Designing Africa's Ox-Powered Farm Tools REMIX
Buying tractors or the fuel required to power them is far beyond the reach of most African small farmers. At the same time, they are tired from the energy draining attempt to raise their families bey
Hello, we are students in the 2009/10 Industrial Design class at The University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas USA. We are interested in applying socially directed design to make meaningful contributions to solving everyday problems faced by the majority of people in our world today. We are offering our collaboration as design students to contribute to this IDEA and assist in advancing its presentation or implementation in some way. Inspired by the problem statement posted we have ideas and questions we hope can be clarified by collaborative input from those of you who are experts in your field or have lived or observed the condition the IDEA intends to resolve. Here are some of the initial questions we would like some help with:
- What specific farm tools need to be re-designed?
- Why do those tools need to be re-designed?
- Should tool re-designs be focused more toward donkeys or oxen?
- What materials would be used and would they be readily available in the local communities?
POST #2:
RESEARCH: Based on the reply we got to our first post, we began to research the available materials; rebar and leaf springs (spring steel). If we can use these common materials in the re-design of the farm tools, production costs and manufacturing will be facilitated.
REBAR: used in many structural applications like concrete work. Can be welded but not without compromising the fatigue life of the material and some cannot be welded at all. Most rebar is connected with ties.
LEAF SPRINGS: also known as spring steel, is generally used in automotive suspension. Can be re-forged and used in many applications.
Rebar could easily be used in the handle portion of this design while the leaf spring could be used for the main frame of the plow. The possibility of injection molded plastic, as mentioned in the reply, could be used in the handle portion of the design or other low torque applications.
In the reply on the ARC site it was stated that the existing plows are made from cast iron which is extremely heavy. Modern material such as welded steel would make the plow lighter and easier to transport.
As far as the harnessing goes, it was stated that there was not much difference between the donkeys and the oxen. Therefore the same harnesses could be used with minor adjustments.
MOST RECENT QUESTIONS 11/1/09:
- Do you have a suggestion for which tool we could possibly redesign?
- Do you have any pictures of that tool or is there somewhere we can go to get information or specifications on that tool?
- Is there a need to develop a different harnessing system?
- Will this tool be pulled by donkeys or oxen? Or possibly both?
- Do you have any further suggestions as to which direction we should take on a tool redesign?
For a more in depth proposal e-mail : cheichel@ku.edu
Got a suggestion on how to make this idea even better?
REMIX IT!
