Lipscomb's concrete canoe team takes seventh place prize at 2016 ASCE Southeast Student Conference
Lacey Klotz |
A team of nearly 15 student engineers from Lipscomb’s Raymond B. Jones College of Engineering took seventh place out of 22 teams in the American Society of Civil Engineers’ regional Concrete Canoe competition, held at the University of Alabama on March 10-12.
Led by Lindsey Belt and Daniela Rodriguez, co-project managers and senior civil engineer students at Lipscomb, the volunteer team spent time from September 
2015-March 2016 working to design and build a concrete canoe that would be tested in a myriad of ways including its design, structural integrity, aesthetics, academics and in five races in water.
With its 230-pound, 22-foot-long, 26-inch wide by 13-inch deep concrete canoe named “Old Faithful,” the Lipscomb team also placed in the top five for its design paper, top 10 for its oral presentation and final product and 11th in the concrete canoe races.
“This was Lipscomb’s second time participating in the concrete canoe competition, and last year’s team was a senior design project,” said Belt. “This year, we had a team of volunteers and because of that there was a lot of camaraderie and excitement for the process.”
Made up of materials such as microspheres, fiberglass mesh reinforcement, chicken wire, Type III Portland cement, water and Keraply, the team was able to get the weight of the canoe to nearly 200 pounds, and dropped it nearly a third of the weight of last year’s.
“We definitely took the materials for last year’s canoe into consideration and kept detailed notebooks while designing and building our canoe this year to not only 
help with our overall presentation, but to also help prepare next year’s team,” said Belt.
In order to purchase the materials for the project, the team created a budget and began a fundraising campaign. They received a $4,000 donation from Lipscomb’s Student Government Association as well as other monetary and material donations from local engineering firms such as Gresham Smith.
The canoe was built in the Concrete Lab located in the Raymond B. Jones College of Engineering and Chris Gwaltney, professor in civil engineering at Lipscomb, and Mark McDonald, assistant professor in mechanical engineering, assisted students throughout the process.
“The team leadership this year was outstanding,” said Gawltney. “Daniela and Lindsey worked on developing strong team relationships first and then focused on the canoe’s design and construction. I couldn't be more proud of this team's performance.”
Belt said this competition allowed team members to not only be involved and have a good support system within the college, but it also allowed 
students to apply what they are learning in the classroom to a real life experience.
“There is a concrete class for civil engineer students in the Raymond B. Jones College of Engineering and it teaches students how to design concrete,” said Belt. “This competition allows for a practical engineering application and gives students the opportunity to apply what they are learning at Lipscomb to a real-life project.”
A special display of the canoe was featured in the Bennett Campus Center on Thursday, April 29, courtesy of SGA. The concrete canoe will remain on the back porch of Hughes along with last year’s canoe.