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In many parts of the world, clothes washing is a strenuous task performed mostly by women. Traditional techniques require accessing a nearby river or pulling out large quantities of water from a well. The hand rubbing of clothes is difficult and time-consuming. Technical Description Build a pedal-powered washing machine to be used in rural, low-income homes. Use bicycle parts as much as possible in the construction. Important criteria are: user comfort, wash quality, and water and soap economy. Community Maya Pedal of Chimaltenango, Guatemala, manufactures pedal-powered machines. They have developed a number of prototypes, but none have been produced in quantity. They are interested in a design, and asking them for the feedback they received on the original prototypes would be a good place to start. Bikes not Bombs of Boston would be interested in distributing plans for building similar machines in other parts of the world. Project Status A collaboration project with Maya Pedal is in the works through the MITERS student group. A number of alternative designs to choose are available, including the ones Maya Pedal has already tried. No design evaluation or brainstorming has taken place yet on the MIT side, so this is a pretty open project. Radu Raduta
<rradu@mit.edu> |
