Fluid Bench project at NUST, Pakistan

Fluid Bench Project is a project offered to the students of Bachelor’s in Mechanical Engineering and is conducted under the tutelage of IMechE NUST Student Chapter.

The project is used as means of scrutinising the abilities and prowess of sophomores in solving practical and real-life fluid mechanics problems as well as polishing the self-learning abilities of students. The project is conducted with the sponsorship from KSB Pumps and School of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering (SMME), National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST). KSB Pumps works in close association with NUST to ensure the training of quality engineers from Pakistan.

^{The fluid benches designed by IMechE NSC. The benches were combined to lower the rate at which the initial pressure head falls whilst allowing for a system to be tested at each bench}

The project was conducted as the semester project for the students of Fluid Mechanics-2 course of SMME, NUST. The participants are required to achieve predefined pressure heads at up to five out of eight points on the provided bench. An initial head was provided through a tank installed at the top of the bench. Students were required to consider all sorts of losses (major and minor) and advance a possible solution in the form of a pipe network. Students were to demonstrate and were called for viva voce where their learning was appraised. Unique problem statements were designed for all of the 36 groups participating.

The event’s preparations were initiated well in time according to a chalked-out timeline. An organising committee (OC) was formed, and technical work was initiated months before the start.

^{Students connecting their piping system before their demonstration.}

The event was headed by Mr. Abdullah Zafar and Mr. Abdullah Hayat. The OC worked in close collaboration with the technical team. The bench was designed and modified by a dedicated team led by Mr. Zeeshan Arsha, of Mr. Bilal Ghani, Mr. Uzair Shakeel and Mr. Muhammad Owais. Once the problem statement was designed, it was forwarded to the students. A seminar was conducted in order to help students understand the complexities of the problem and form a pertinent thinking approach.

^{A piping network making use of connectors and elbows to create sufficient losses whilst staying on the perimeter of the bench.}

The demonstration of the designed piping networks and the corresponding evaluation was carried out over a week’s span in the respective lab session of each group from 29 April to 3 May. The demonstration was scrutinised by Mr. Mansoor-ud-din Chishti (Faculty SMME) and Dr. Muhammad Sajid (Faculty SMME) and viva voce was conducted mainly by Mr. Chishti. The marking criterion accommodated 2cm tolerance for each head. A report was also collected and assessed by Dr. Muhammad Sajid.

^{A network neatly designed, ready for its evaluation.}

A total of 36 teams participated in the event. Dr. Emad Uddin (Faculty SMME) and Dr. Zaib Ali(Faculty SMME) provided support to the chapter in organising the project. The project was able to engage around 100 non-IMechE Members and 30 IMechE Members either as audience or as participants.

^{A participating team giving the post-demonstration viva to Mr. Mansoor Chishti.}

The event provided the students with a learning opportunity, who were able to take the following from the event:

• Ability to apply their classroom knowledge of fluid mechanics, with a specific focus on internal pipe flow, to designing pipe systems to fulfill the pressure head requirements.
• An experience of the scaled down engineering complexities associated with designing piping networks for cities.
• Correlating theoretical work with a final practical design.

The students provided a positive feedback to the chapter which encouraged IMechE NUST Student Chapter to continue organising such projects and competitions in the future.