Cal Poly Senior Project: Wildfire Hose Clamp

Overview

During the final year of my mechanical engineering degree at Cal Poly, I worked on a team of four students to complete my senior project requirement. Our project was in conjunction with the California Wildfire Concervancy, an organization devoted to making wildfire fighting safer and more efficient. Widland firefighters use hose clamps to temporarily stop water flow in a hose, allowing additional hose sections to be attached. However, Existing hose clamps often have the following problems: 

• Fail to completely shut off the water 

• Damage or rupture the hose 

• Break at the hinge 

• Fatigue and bending of clamp

Our task was to design, prototype, and test a new hose clamp design that would attempt to solve these issues. This page provides a brief description of the project, but for more details see the full report below.

 Design Process

After an initial ideation phase, we settled on a hybrid design that both kinks and clamps the hose. This design was favorable due to its potential to eliminate damage to the hose, minimize water flow, and have high durability. We created a 3D model of our design in SolidWorks, focusing on creating flat parts that can be cut on the waterjet. 

Final Design Report