Paper trail UMaine squad brainstorms to create cellulose snowboard for national competition

One of the most rudimentary forms of sledding that a child learns is grabbing a chunk of cardboard, hopping on, then sliding down a hill.

This method works great for a time. Then the cardboard gets soggy and starts to fall apart. The child either must find more cardboard, or the fun comes to an end.

Now imagine the task facing a dozen University of Maine students: creating a functional snowboard made up of at least 80 percent paper fiber.

Maine is one of 14 schools nationwide taking part in the Institute of Paper Science and Technology’s annual Energy Challenge, an event sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy. Goals of the competition include promoting energy efficiency and recycling.

The 14 teams will gather in early April in Winter Park, Colo., to race their boards and compare notes.

With past Energy Challenge projects including paper sails and paper hang gliders, Maine’s squads have been at a disadvantage, unable to test their prototypes until they arrived at the nationals. But an object to use in snow, that’s another matter.

“There’s quite a few southern teams, so we believe it will give us an edge going in,” said John Hwalek, an associate professor of chemical engineering who is the team’s advisor. “We’re excited about having a chance to test it before the competition.”

Testing of UMaine’s prototype took place on a recent Friday at Hermon Mountain. The ski slope’s regulars must have wondered why all the hairdos and their camera crews were bunched around a rather drab-looking snowboard, emblazoned with the word “Maine” and Maine Engineers stickers on either end.

That snowboard was the product of five months worth of brainstorming. After testing on a smaller slope the previous day, it was time for a real test slide on the board, the bottom of which had been coated with normal snowboard wax.

Jay Mitchell, the group’s most experienced snowboarder, was selected to try it out. He started low and slow, but kept going farther up the mountain and faster down. He even tried a little hot-dogging while going over a small mogul near the bottom, but landed in a heap.

Based on Friday’s testing, “We made the frame a little lighter than on the prototype,” team captain Mike Byrd, a senior chemical engineering major from Bangor, explained afterward. “We saw that strength wasn’t going to be a big issue, so we made it lighter to make it easier to handle.”

At the nationals, each team will race its snowboard, in a three-run, timed slalom event. But race results only count for 20 percent of a squad’s score.

The biggest segment of the scoring, 30 percent, is for how the snowboard holds up under destructive testing. The team must fabricate two identical boards, one for riding, one for testing.

“It has to meet certain strength properties,” Byrd said. “They test bending, compression strength, how it resists punctures, things you’d want out of a normal snowboard.”

The Maine team has been working on the board since September. Since challenge rules require that it be made out of at least 80 percent cellulose, or paper, fiber, they quickly had to discard normal snowboard construction of a wooden core coated with layers of synthetic materials.

“We needed it to mimic the properties of a real snowboard, while using paper fiber instead,” Byrd said. “The hardest thing was coming up with a construction method that would work. We were having trouble making something strong enough.”

The squad found a solution, of sorts, at the university’s Advanced Engineered Wood Composites Center. Team members considered a composite such as that used in commercial decking material. Sawdust and plastic are mixed and forced through a die, and the resulting material hardens.

“It blends the good properties of wood and plastic together,” Byrd said.

Sawdust didn’t meet the challenge’s paper-fiber criteria. Instead, a substitute was found at the Georgia-Pacific mill in Old Town, in the form of tissue dust. The tissue dust and polypropylene were blended in a composite frame, with pure cellulose in the middle for added strength. After finding a workable concept, the Maine team spent the last three weeks building their board.

Finding the right formula is a crucial part of the competition.

“The nonpaper additives can add up quickly, and you need them for stiffness and to make the surface smooth,” Hwalek explained. “There needs to be a balance of fiber and additives. As you use more chemicals, that balance can be difficult to achieve.”

The Mainers will have to send off one of the prototypes by mid-March. The entire team, Hwalek and the racing board will be going to Colorado.

“This has been the most successful, so we’re going with it,” Hwalek said. “I think we’re feeling pretty confident now.”

Dale McGarrigle can be reached at 990-8028 or dmcgarrigle@bangordailynews.net.