The pedal powered mechanical blender was designed by Bart Orlando and built with the assistance of Saremy Graves, an HSU student who received class credit for her participation in the project in 1997. It was used to make smoothies, salad dressings and in the process of creating homemade paper. A skate board wheel rolls along the side of the exercise bike's flywheel. This spins a driveshaft which is attached to the skateboard wheel. The driveshaft is supported by two pillow blocks. The top end of the driveshaft is modified to mimic the shape of the piece that inserts into the blade assembly at the base of the ingredient container on the original blender.
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Co-director Sean Dockery demonstrates how this blender can be used to make a pesto salad dressing.
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After many years of use by HSU students the blender drive system is in the process of being rebuilt in a way that incorporates several new and improved design features. These features include a larger crank ring for higher gearing and a pivoting pillow block mount plate that can swing the skateboard wheel and drive shaft out of the way when working on the bike. The large crank-ring was custom machined by the Industrial Technology department at HSU. In this way the engines of this university can be harnessed to make practical contributions toward bringing CCAT pedal powered projects to fruition.
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In 2000, electrical power brown-outs swept across California because of Enron's corrupt energy deals. Enron's mis-dealings cost California 12 billion dollars. When the S.F. Chronical searched for an answer to Enron they featured an article about CCAT on the front page of their paper,........ "above the fold"!
