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Abstract
The purpose of this project was to optimize the design of a pneumatic (compressed air) thruster for use on boats and investigate whether this type of thruster would be suitable for use in a Solar Splash competition. A thrust measuring test tank was designed and constructed to compare the thrust output of various compressed air thrusters to find the optimal design. 60 unique 3D printed thrusters were tested in a total of 420 total configurations. From this group, 4 configurations produced a higher thrust than the baseline. The best thruster of those 4 produced 6% more thrust than a plain air nozzle holding all other variables constant. This improvement is meaningful, but not enough to make compressed air a viable option for Solar Splash due to the overall efficiency, energy density of compressed air, and the complexity of converting to this system. This project was successful in optimizing the thruster design and proving it can improve efficiency. While there is not a viable use case in Solar Splash, a pneumatic thruster can still be useful. Applications such as long-term storage safety boats, docking bow thrusters, and short distance water taxis/ferries could all benefit from using a pneumatic thruster.