Thursday, April 30, 2015

Vehicle Safety Report

A total of twelve students and one instructor from Physics: Heat, Electricity, and Magnetism performed standard safety checks on a total of forty-eight student vehicles Tuesday, April 28th.

Thanks to students Andrew, Thomas, Clark, Sierra, Steven, Arthur, Carolyn, Matthew, Stephenie, Jacob, Wesley, Sylvester, and Andrew for all their hard work, their superior appreciation for the finer points of vehicle safety, and their high regard for their classmates' lives and property.



Photos: Students Wesley and Sierra in action on the day

There was high demand for our services, the most ever, and we were short staffed at times, so I couldn't get photos of each student worker, as I have done in the past. Apologies for that.

Most vehicles passed inspection. Vehicles were, on the average, noticeably safer than in the past.* Several more egregious safety concerns were noted that would have almost certainly related in a holiday travel "fail" and possibly a stranding, or worse, an accident:
  • Several vehicles were significantly low on oil, up to three quarts down. When you only have one or two quarts of oil remaining in your engine, the engine will begin to overheat because that little oil can't do such a great job of cooling and lubricating. You also might want to know why your oil is so low. Most likely you are leaking it or burning it. Either way, you must now monitor your oil level more carefully or you will cause a catastrophic engine failure, called a seizure. Essentially, your pistons will stick to your cylinder walls and/or your main bearings will stick to your crankshaft. Check the oil level every time you get gas. Write down how much you add, when you added it, and the odometer reading each time you check. Check the ground under where you park for signs of a leak. Monitor your oil pressure light or pressure gauge, check engine light, and temperature gauge. Hopefully, you'll figure out how much oil you're using and find the leak if there is one, then get it fixed.
  • Many vehicles had tires that had only a millimeter or two of tread remaining. The Maine regulations require at least a millimeter all round, but this isn't enough for Maine summer driving conditions if there is heavy rain or mud on the roads, especially in a rear-wheel drive vehicle. These students were advised to get new tires, preferably before taking any long trip.
  • Although a few were five or slightly more PSI down, no tires had dangerously low tire pressure. This is a first. Maybe our efforts to educate about such things are paying off!
  • Two vehicles had scored and rusty disc rotors visible through aluminum wheels. If disc rotors are scored, they need to be replaced or turned down on a lathe. Replace pads at the same time, and do at least the rear or front brake sets together, if not all four sets. If they are rusty, your brake caliper is not working and needs to be repaired. This is a very dangerous condition on any vehicle.
  • For the second time in a row, several students did not know how to turn on their headlights manually. Automatic headlights are fine, but Maine law requires you to have the headlights on whenever the wipers are turning, so you need to know where this switch is! Consult your owner's manual. You can get copies of your manual online if you have lost or never had yours.
That concludes our biannual community vehicle safety report. If you didn't get chance to get your vehicle checked out yesterday and are worried about the drive home, stop me or one of our student volunteers and ask us about it, or take it to a shop for a check up before your drive home.

*Enter "Vehicle Safety" in the Google Blogger search engine above to previous reports. 

Wednesday, April 29, 2015

Monday, April 20, 2015

Vehicle safety checks next Tuesday 28th

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7b/X-wing.jpg 

or

(And yes, this was a car once driven to and from college by a Unity student!)

Dear students:

Graduating? Or just getting out of Dodge for the summer?
Before driving off into the wild blue yonder, consider taking advantage of free vehicle check-outs next week, Tuesday April 28th, 1.00 - 4.30 pm, in front of the Activities Building.

Are you a stereotypical Unity College "rugged individual” type? How rugged? Do you really want to find out? Getting stranded in an unpleasant, uncool, or just plain dangerous neck of the woods is one really good way to find out.

Alternately, take advantage of the service offered by your fellow students to prevent such occurrences.

The new Star Wars movie isn’t quite out yet, but we know aging-but-truly-rugged pro star pilot Luke Skywalker always does his own maintenance and lubes on his X-Wing Starfighter. But are you properly trained to fix up your trusty star-steed?

Instead, let the experienced mechanics and other student grease warriors, this year’s team of brave volunteers, check the poor beast out.

We will check your tires and tire pressures and pump them up if necessary, check and top off the oil and other fluids, make sure everything seems firmly attached, and finally and perhaps most usefully, if your CHECK ENGINE light is on, we will use our computer reader to “pull” your trouble codes so you can finally know just what it is that your poor neglected automobile has been trying to tell you all these months.

(Did you know you can save lots of gas and help the climate just by keeping your car’s tires at the proper pressures over the changing seasons? That tire pressures can naturally raise around 4-to 8 PSI between winter and summer if not checked, because of cold? Did you know that a blown oxygen sensor is easy to fix and can save on gas too? Did you know that low oil level can kill your car’s engine? Well, now you know.)

Each participant will receive a written report on the serviceability of their vehicle, with details of any trouble codes and what they mean.

The college accepts no responsibility for the use or misuse of any of the information we give you about your vehicle, or for your car’s safety after you leave the campus, but we do suggest that it’s always better to know than not to know. In most cases.

Employees are welcome too. Thanks to the Maintenance and Student Affairs departments for aid in providing this service.

Brought to you by the students and faculty of this semester’s PS 2004, Physics: Heat, Electricity and Magnetism class.

Remember: Go green, or don’t go.

Mick Womersley

Professor

Thursday, April 2, 2015

ESS Project descriptions and work plan

Following your discussions with Dr. Kahl today, outline in your groups and prepare a formal, one page project description and work plan:
  1. A paragraph description of your project, including target audience/survey population, and technology requirements
  2. A workplan, including timelines, deadlines, and individual assignments for group members. The grade for the project will be split 50-50 between how good the the overall project is, and any individual performance, particularly in meeting deadlines and producing high quality work. The workplan should assign as many tasks as can be assigned, and detail who is going to be responsible for which task. If it's a group task, not individual, say so. I will be asking for anonymous assessments of individual performance from each group. You may change the workplan as you go along, but you need to file one with me by next Thursday
  3. This assignment will be worth 5% of the 30% grade for the project
  4. HEADS-UP: Groups will present their projects in class at the end of the semester