Trip to Lesotho, January 2006

Bethel Campus and Surrounding Region
Coming into Bethel: Oasis in the Desert
On Bethel Campus
Fields near Bethel
Nearby cave paintings
Flag of Lesotho
Kingdom in the Sky: Mountains!
More mountains
Erosion Gully nearby (the Donga)
Donga2
Donga3
Donga4
Donga: watch the top soil leaving Lesotho

MIT Team and Lodging
The MIT team has dinner
Ducks being raised by Ivan, BBCDC Founder
Grapes growing outside the guest flat
Group photo 1
Group photo 2

MIT, BBCDC, and ATS Teams get to work
Monica in a steel-grinding groove
Perry, expert chopsawer extraordinaire
BBCDC students welding one of the trough frames
Framebuilding continues
Workcrew outside the workstop
Still hard at work

Making the Parabolic Troughs
Amy shaping out the parabolic troughs
Parabolic ribs before installation.
Lining up parabolic supports on trough frames with laser levels.
The laser level's view of the process
The ORC engine, pre-assembly.
Amy working on the control system.

Installing and testing the troughs
The light focuses on the pipe! Optics were fantastic, almost 42:1 concentration ratio.
Installing the troughs
ATS students inspect the bearings

System Photos
Up at 4:45 on the last day to watch the tracker start following the sun.
Daylight photo of the array.
It's huge!
Finally coming together!
Parabola array.

Organic Ranking Cycle Engine: Installation
ORC engine 1
ORC engine 2
ORC engine 3
ORC engine 4
ORC engine 5
ORC engine 6
ORC engine 7
Amy wiring up the pumps & motors
The whole system together.
We needed 30,000:1 reduction to turn this puppy with such a small motor! (We'll design to balance this better next time.)

Summer Rainstorm in the mountains
Rainbows
Rainbows1
Rainbows2
Rainbows3
Rainbows4
Rainbows5