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Candle-Powered Heat Engine
Project type
Small Heat Engine
Date
December 2022
Location
University of Colorado Boulder
The purpose of this project was to do some sort of work with a candle-powered heat engine. My team decided to create a small boiler out of a CO2 canister. We filled the canister with water and heated it from below. Upon opening a valve, the canister would shoot steam over a Pelton wheel. The Pelton wheel turned and pulled a small weight up over a short distance. We could measure the distance that the weight traveled to calculate the work put out by the heat engine. I came up with preliminary designs for this project and also did all of the CAD for it. Fun fact: the Pelton wheel was inspired by the one on Grizzly River Run in Disney’s California Adventure.
