The Idea and Motivation o Microwaves caused ~7,400 fires in 2005 n 87 - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Fire Safe Microwave Reid Allen - Red B

The Idea and Motivation o Microwaves caused ~7,400 fires in 2005 n 87 injuries and $18 million property damage. o Prevent fires caused by sparks and flame inside the microwave o Reduce Fire Department false alarms associated with microwave oven use

Customer, Market and Benchmarking o Customer: Original Equipment Manufacturer n Major microwave producers GE and Sharp have >40% market share o o End-User: households n 13.5 million microwaves sold last year in US n $3.8 billion sales o SafeT Sensor – Patent Pending

Customer Contract Customer Need ¡ Product Attribute(s) ¡ Alarm when detect spark ¡ Visual/Auditory Signal ¡ Detection Area ¡ Able to sense spark in whole microwave space ¡ Price ¡ Low Cost ¡ Reliable spark detection ¡ Needs to be consistent ¡ Minimally intrusive ¡ Not affect conventional microwave functions ¡ MEAN ¡ 11.4% ($34.23 on $300) ¡ Standard Deviation ¡ 13.7% ($41.14 on $300) ¡

Mock-Up Goals o Power off microwave if sparks or flames occur o Find a permanent location for our sensor n Faraday Cage test n Microwave tear down, research o Understand physics of microwave sparks and flames n Ignition testing n Effect of microwaves on flame o Identify situations causing false positives

Future Work o Reduce manufacturing costs o Eliminate false positives o Develop user interface n Auditory, visual warning n Reset switch

Thank you