The students at Maharishi University of Management displayed exceptional creativity in designing a machine that uses no electrical energy to quickly flatten cans for recycling.

Maharishi University of Management students create useful invention
by Maharishi University of Management, Iowa, USA, The Review
3 June 2010

One more time students in the Maharishi University of Management Sustainable Living Program have walked their talk, designing and building a can crusher that is saving the University money and helping the environment at the same time.

As part of the course on Materials and Methods for Sustainability they tackled a timely issue: Food Services was simply discarding all of their one-gallon cans rather than recycling.

A main obstacle to recycling was the need to flatten these one-gallon cans—something that's not possible without the aid of a mechanism of some sort. The students priced a machine for flattening cans and found that it would cost $3,500 at minimum. Also, it used electricity and was slow, taking about 30 seconds to flatten a can.

They decided they could do better and set to work creating a design.

Their goal was to make one that would work without electricity and be faster. The result: a human-powered press that flattens a can in eight seconds. Total cost? About $500.

"It's a great example of sustainability," said Mark Stimson, who taught the course. "The University is saving money, no electricity is being used, and the cans are now being recycled."

Using basic principles of leverage, their mechanism applies over a thousand pounds of pressure with little effort from the operator, Mr. Stimson said.

He said that commercial can crushers use a "brute force" method of crushing cans straight down, which takes several thousand pounds of force. The mechanism created by the students has the can turned on its side, which requires less than a quarter of the energy.

After three weeks of operation, Food Services had already recycled about 1,000 pounds of steel.

The students designed their crusher as part of the course, and then student Nate Hendrick continued to work on it after class over the next few months. He and Mr. Stimson installed it in the kitchen earlier this month.

"So far it has handled the task quite nicely," Mr. Hendrick said.

© Copyright 2010, Maharishi University of Management