The engineering of the Biocoil has been a very frustrating and strung out process. When we started on the Biocoil it was ten years old. The previous groups had done their own modifications and improvements. The group before us has just rewrapped the Biocoil with new tubing and had the manifold set to run 2-800ft sections of tubing, where the original plan was to have 4-400ft sections. The problem was that the pump didn’t have enough power to run that much water that far at the same time. So when we started working on the Biocoil that was the first thing we set to fixing. One day we decided to call a pump expert to come tell us the problem. We couldn’t believe how simple the problem was. He found that our volts were mixed up causing us to lose power. We had 220 volts running to 110 volt instead of 220 volts to 220 volts. As soon as he switched them back to normal, he turned the pump on and I opened the valve all the way; the next thing we knew we blew a connector which showed we had full power! This was a great break through we could then put 4-400ft sections back on and gets the Biocoil back to its original state. Where we live it gets real cold, cold enough to freeze our Biocoil. So to prevent this we wrap the outside in 6-mil plastic and put a heater inside to keep everything warm. One day one of us forgot to put the plastic back down over the door, leaving the tubes exposed. You guessed it, our tubes froze all the way back to the manifold, which was only made of 2 inch PVC piping. The frozen water expanded and broke our manifold. This was our next problem; we had to rebuild the whole manifold. But to keep the algae alive we decided to use a Biocoil made a few years earlier, the “mini Biocoil” We though we could keep growing the algae in the little Biocoil and it worked! Rebuilding the manifold took new 2-inch PVC Piping, new valves and the time and effort to do it right. We finally got the manifold built and put back into the Biocoil. It worked great. We built a stand that we could put insulation in, to keep the pipes from freezing again. Once the Biocoil was running again we received an e-mail from a man in Australia, named Lloyd Godson. He was going to build an underwater habitat to live in for 2 weeks. He wanted us to build a Biocoil to put in his underwater habitat called the Biosub. Another great part of this opportunity is that our Biocoil can be an oxygen producer a carbon dioxide scrubber, food source, and also a waste disposal. As is it can also be used for space travel and hopefully when we are done our project may be given to NASA for a possible first trip to Mars. So as this came up, we started on ideas and designs that we though would work for him. Our final design consisted of 2 tanks, one pump and 3 coils. (Pic of Biosub for visual) this idea was great, but as summer was coming we all had to make room in our schedule to build this new Biocoil. So our group set up dates and times that we could meet to build the Biosub. Building the Biosub was not a very difficult process. The hard part was getting every one together to help build it We used 2X4’s for the majority of the frame, 4X4’s for the base and 3/4” plywood for the shelves. The framing is screwed together so if we have to take it apart it will be easy. Just before school started, we finished the construction. As we began running water though it, we discovered leaks and weak spots. They were easily fixed and strengthened. Now we had other problems to deal with, problems like: Oxygen production and usage, CO2 scrubbing, pigging, and humidity. Not to mention getting the funds to go to Australia to build it for Lloyd. We have decided to wrap the Biosub in 6mil visquene plastic and make it air tight so carbon dioxide and oxygen production can be measured accurately, with a Dragger Multiwarn 2 which was graciously loaned to us. Our newest problem is if our design doesn’t produce enough oxygen or use up carbon dioxide fast enough we will have to redesign our Biocoil. Currently we are having problems with too much moisture, so we are going to switch over to a one take system, but still hope to get the carbon dioxide scrubbed and oxygen produced. We will continue to make new designs on the Biosub based on the data.