Rowing Canoes
Note: All experiences in this article are written by Laura, Patricia and Carolina. We are sharing our personal experiences from the years we participated as part of the UPRM Concrete Canoe Team. Every University has their own way of doing things, and we wanted to share ours with all the readers of our blog.
Rowing Concrete Canoes… Crazy right?!
The concrete canoe is a competition that has been around for many decades. The first concrete canoe competition can be traced back all the way to the 1960’s, when a number of ASCE Student Chapters began holding the concrete canoe races! It’s still known as one of the biggest competitions of the ASCE were many universities go head to head and compete to see who will be the overall winner. So, who will be telling their stories today? Keep reading to find out!
First of all what is the ASCE?
The ASCE stands for the American Society of Civil Engineers. ASCE is a leading provider of technical and professional conferences and continuing education. They are devoted to build a professional society for the designers and builders of society, while taking into consideration the new practices and developments every year to make a more safe and sustainable future.
How does one start building a Concrete Canoe?
Constructing a Concrete Canoe consists of various steps. One must first design the Hull of the Canoe. During this process, the mix that will be used to cast the Canoe will also be getting designed and tested. After the design of the canoe and mix are finalized, the mold will be constructed and then used to build the canoe!
To better understand each phase :
Hull Design: One starts by designing the hull of the Canoe using CAD or any other program you believe suited for this, and testing out the design until one that passes all the parameters established by the competition is achieved. It is important to take into consideration the geometry of the canoe, since the purpose of the canoe is to row it and compete later on in the competitions. This means it has to be designed to be as fast and agile on water as possible. The design of the canoe consists of various parts, including the stern, bow, keel, gunwale and rocker.
Mix Design: The main goal is to create a buoyant concrete mix that will sustain the weight of various rowers and weigh as little as possible. This is achieved by mixing concrete with various small light weight aggregates and additives. Each batch of mix must be tested, by doing tension, compression, and buoyancy test and amongst others to thoroughly examine the strength of the mix. This is a process of trial and error, were mixes are created and tested until achieving the desired outcome.
Construction of Mold: The team later proceeds to create the mold of the canoe. There are two ways one can create a mold. One is either creating a female mold, which consists of cutting the shape of the canoe into a block of Styrofoam or wood and filling it with concrete, or the male mold which consists of building the inner dimensions of the canoe, generally placing the mold upside down on the table, and placing the mix on top of this. Molds are generally made of either Styrofoam or wood.
Building the Canoe: During the process of building the canoe, the mix is applied while taking into consideration the thickness of the canoe. The thickness is really important since this could determine whether the canoe is strong enough to hold the rowers, or to heavy to float. Reinforcements are also placed during this phase of the project. First a layer of the mix is applied on top of the mold, then a reinforcing mesh is carefully layered on top. After this, another layer of mix is applied to achieve a uniform and clean look for the canoe. This is a tedious and long process, but its worth being as careful and meticulous as possible to achieve the desired outcome.
Curing the Canoe: After building the canoe, the next step is curing the canoe to ensure its maximum strength and durability. The canoe is cured for a total 28 days in a hydrated environment. This step is of outmost importance, since this can determine whether your canoe will preform as desired during the competitions.
Removing the mold: After the curing process, the mold is removed. Depending on how the mold was designed, the process of removing the canoe can be a little tedious, but being careful to prevent cracks or any damage to the canoe is extremely important. Depending on the material of the mold, the mold can be reused as well.
Rowing the Canoe: For the purposes of practicing and testing out the canoe before the competitions, two canoes are normally made. One would be used for practice, while the other one will be used for the competitions. Normally the canoe used for the competitions isn’t used to practice due to the event of a possible mishap during practice.
That’s it! You have completed all the steps to create a Concrete Canoe!
Competitions here we go!
The ASCE Competitions on 2019 were held in Knoxville, Tennessee. That year the theme for our Canoe was Blueprint, and we competed with Universities from the Southeast Region!
The Concrete Canoe Competitions are divided into various parts that will be evaluated for a total of an overall score. These consists of:
Technical Paper
Oral Presentation
Races
All of these points are added to decide an overall winner for the ASCE Concrete Canoe Competitions.
Surprise, we also made it to the Nationals!
Surprise! We made it to Nationals! This was actually a really unforgettable experience since we got the chance to compete with people from all over the world. It was a different scale, and we learned, networked and improved a lot through this experience. Not to mention, that won the Innovation Award amongst all the other universities!
Quick Facts!
This is considered a year-long project, in which the process consists of training for the rowing competitions, fundraising for the project and building the canoe!
We would train every weekend and practice our rowing in preparation for the competitions.
The rules slightly change every year, mainly in the aggregates one must and must not add to the concrete mix being designed.
There is an award called The Spirit Award! It is given to the University that show the most spirit and enthusiasm during the competitions.
There is also an award called the Innovation Award, which is given to the university that showed out of the box thinking and applied it to the design of the canoe.
Apart from the Concrete Canoe, the ASCE Student Conference consist of various competitions that will later on be totaled to an Overall Score. The UPRM has one the ASCE Student Conference a total of 5 times in row in the last years!
The Concrete Canoe competitions are divided in 10 regions, where the University of Puerto Rico falls under the Southeast Region.
