Product Viability
1. Loads will be transferred to the product as people sit on the chair or people use the chair to put their things on. The loads within the chair will be transferred from the seat where loads are placed to the legs so that the force is divided across the multiple legs, and some of the load is also transferred to the backrest. The chair will hold static loads as people don’t usually move around a lot when sitting down, and the loads can be calculated by the weight of the people or objects on the chair. For the product to work it will need to be able to support the magnitude of the loads. The materials we will choose for the chair will last years because there is not a cheap material that will be able to last decades for us to use. The density and weight is important for our design as we need materials with higher density for sturdiness while the weight needs to be light so it remains portable. Our materials would need to be resistant to the environment, but it will not be able to withstand major impacts. The material will need to go through repetitive loading because of its function as a chair, and it should be able to function through the normal range of temperatures. The materials may not react to sunlight or temperature that much, but chemical will be dangerous as they can destroy or deform the components. The product will not require any source of power, it will not have moving parts, and there are no machines included in the design. The components of the product will interact effectively as they fit together through pegs or Velcro. The loads will transfer smoothly because the parts are attached securely and do not move. Our product will not require any input of energy to function. Our material would require the conversion of crude oil into plastics through the process of distillation and cracking of the oil into polymers. Our design will not involve any electricity, electronics, or computers.
2. Some laws and codes that we found related to our product include the; Federal Hazardous Substances Act, The Packaging and Labeling Act, The Lead Poisoning Prevention Act, Fire Safety. The Federal Hazardous Substances Act states that we cannot sell anything that puts our consumers in harm's way. The Packaging and Labeling Act ensures that we put truthful information on our labeling that gives complete warnings, etc. The Lead Poisoning Prevention Act states we cannot allow the use of poisonous lead on our product. Then Fire Safety ensures our product is not flammable. Our product meets the requirements of all of these laws ensuring it is a safe to use fold-able chair.
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2. Some laws and codes that we found related to our product include the; Federal Hazardous Substances Act, The Packaging and Labeling Act, The Lead Poisoning Prevention Act, Fire Safety. The Federal Hazardous Substances Act states that we cannot sell anything that puts our consumers in harm's way. The Packaging and Labeling Act ensures that we put truthful information on our labeling that gives complete warnings, etc. The Lead Poisoning Prevention Act states we cannot allow the use of poisonous lead on our product. Then Fire Safety ensures our product is not flammable. Our product meets the requirements of all of these laws ensuring it is a safe to use fold-able chair.
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4. During the development of our product, it is consequential to the environment because of the manufacturing process. Since our product will mainly consist of plastic, the manufacturing process would require crude oil, the use of chemical reactions and the use of heat to split the basic molecules. This is destructive to the environment as the process releases greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, dumps chemicals into the ocean, and in order to obtain crude oil you have to drill which puts habitats at risk. The product would only be consequential to the user if the product breaks, the user isn’t satisfied with the product, and it would be hard to recycle at the end of its lifecycle. The employees would also be at risk as they are exposed to dangerous chemicals when creating the plastic. Nonusers nearby the factories would be affected by the loud machinery and the smells of the chemicals emitted.
Summary
For Part F of the capstone project we began by researching necessary information about how we will produce the product. We researched what materials we would need to use so that our product will work, we used our engineering knowledge to figure out how loads will transfer to and throughout the design, and we researched what the chair needs to be resistant to in the environment. Next we tried to find the laws and safety codes that relate to chairs and furniture; however, there were not any that were specifically toward our type of product, so we found laws that pertained to general items and applied to our product. Then we began to research the life-cycle of products using online resources and the provided PowerPoint, and we used the information we found to create flow diagrams that detailed each stage of the product's life. We found what materials are required for each stage, what is the output from each stage, and what hazardous materials are released at each stage. Lastly we needed to realize what consequences would be made during the developmental and usage stages of the product, so we researched other plastic products and how they affect their environment and the people who are a part of the development process.