A late (but very deserving) congratulations to a member of our agricultural department, Kaesey Glaess. The Iowa State University Fountain Wars team brought home 1st place in the recent American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers (ASABE) Fountain Wars Student Design Competition.

Fountain Wars is a hands-on, real-time design competition where students design and model their entry on-site at the Annual International Meeting (AIM), and build and test their actual entry under time pressure during the competition at the AIM.

Fountain Wars requires a modest design document and limited expenditures. As such, it is primarily targeted at student clubs or participants in sophomore/junior-level class design projects. Teams will arrive at the competition with a design for their fountain, along with the necessary PVC pipe, couplers, fittings, valves, nozzles, and pumps to assemble their design. After making a brief, marketing-style promotion, they will construct their system during a 120-minute construction period.

Awards are based on scores of the written report, oral presentation, construction, technical tasks and aesthetic display segments of the event.

This years tasks were throwing a frisbee with the frisbee starting on the water surface, and balancing a ball with weight being added to one end of the balancing beam. In addition, Iowa State's fountain included proximity sensors that shot off water during the aesthetic display.