help!!! senior project!!!! ASAP

[Why So Cereal? 5,000+ posts]

your test was quite flawed... you mostly measured barrier effects and transmission loss. a dB meter is not acceptable for that test as you cannot resolve the amplitude of each frequency being tested. to truly evaluate deadener you need accelerometers or the ability to measure resonance frequency of materials with a narrow band RTA (our narrow band measurements have 1Hz resolution). having the mic in a fixed position means you were also measuring room modes and phase interference that would not be noticeable with a dB meter. nothing in that test allows you to evaluate the elastomeric and viscoelastic properties of deadener. your judges knew nothing about acoustics... i would have given you an "F". //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif
science fairs aren't about science, they are about self-marketing and speaking skills.

I knew the test was crap lol. It was a last minute idea I got and just went with it. Like I said, about an hour of work.

Our senior projects had to be presented as well, and being that the people grading probably didn't know much about it either, it sounded smart to them and I went with it. Haha

 

[keep_hope_alive Premium Member]

I have been a judge for regional science fairs. I enjoyed it. I could tell who knew their project and who didn't. Most judges were regular people who didn't understand a thing.

I would encourage some and even recommend other steps or teach them something about their experiment. Others I would shoot down for lack of technical feasibility.

I won my colleges engineering expo for a project that designed and demonstrated a delta modulator that digitized a signal from a mic and transmitted it to another room. So they judges could talk and hear themselves. I positioned myself next to a white board so I could explain it to them in terms they understood, and with sketches. I am a good salesman. I won $100 and bought a keg for th EE's since others had way better projects they couldn't explain to the judges.

An my "project" was mandatory for my communications class!

Every year I return as an alumni judge for the expo.

 

[keep_hope_alive Premium Member]

Now This is a cool project...

http://www.ludoislabs.com/Giant_Speaker.html

 

[budgetkiller 10+ year member]

These stories are great! haha