Hyperbaric Chamber Bag

  Following the hyperbaric test, my group participated in a poster presentation where we discussed and answered questions about our design. Duke faculty from all departments were invited to come and see what the students in EGR 101 created. I remember I had a conversation with two nurses who worked in the hyperbaric chambers who I had not previously interacted with when consulting with our client. The nurses praised how much of an improvement our design was over the current solution and how much easier it would make their jobs. Their validation gave me a great deal of respect for what we had accomplished, even if it was for a class. 

My EGR101 project was not all smooth sailing, however. To confirm the airtightness of our design, my group used water-leak testing. As you can see above from out preliminary testing, the bag sprang a leak almost immediately. What was disappointing was that upon several "fixes," the bag still leaked when we filled it with water. Tensions began to rise between teammates and for the first time in most of our academic careers, we had hit a wall. 

Rather than panic or get discouraged as the project due date quickly approached, I stepped in to regain a solid flow of ideas to continue iterating on the design and bounce back from repetitive failures. It was one thing if I had an idea that didn't work out, I could deal with that and move on. When I saw one of my teammates come up with a really solid idea only for it to fail, however, I could see they were more easily discouraged. Sometimes, the best thing you can do as a teammate and leader is be Mr. Positive, especially when a design isn't going well. By refusing to lose my smile, encouraging ideas and rejecting the permanence of small failures, I was able to rally my team to combine all of our ideas into a single design that resulted in our successful final product.