At Shadan College of Engineering and Technology in Hyderabad, a sanitiser sprayer developed in-house is being used to keep the premises contamination-free. Now picture this, a tricycle with a slider-crank mechanism that converts rotary to reciprocatory motion and the sprayers, two in the front and one hand-held in the operator's hand, busily spray sanitiser while the tricycle is being dragged around. 
 

In 2018, Dr Naseeb Khan received his PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Hyderabad

Dr Naseeb Khan, Head of Department, Mechanical Engineering, along with Assistant Professor N Raja Srikanth, supervised the project of four students Syed Tariq Hussaini, Mohammad Mansoor Sharief, Md Naseer Khan and Shaik Abbu Sufiyan. "In the span of three weeks, the simple machine was ready. We made it in our own workshop and the fabrication, welding and manufacturing were all done when students came to college for the viva," informs Dr Naseeb.  

Syed Tariq Hussaini (Pic: Syed Tariq Hussaini)

Both Dr Khan and Tariq also inform us that the device was actually meant to be a pesticide spraying machine to help farmers, but the team instead adapted it into a sanitiser sprayer in their own college. "We were done making it by April end and now, it is being used to sanitise the seminar hall, corridors and classrooms too," informs 26-year-old Tariq and adds, "Though it cost us around Rs 7,000, a lot of hard work went into designing and making it." It was launched last week in the college itself. 
 

They needed a main chassis, big plastic wheel, two trolley wheels, sprayer, nozzles, shaft and more to make the device   

The duo also tell us that they were inspired by the GHMC (Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation) workers who can be spotted carrying a bulky blue can of sanitiser on their back and spraying it using a hand-held nozzle. They wanted to simplify the work and this is how the automatic large-area sanitisation machine came to be. "It was their BTech final-year project and they needed to complete it," informs Dr Khan who has been working at Shadan since 2015. "We are proud that the machine we built is helping our own college," says Tariq who was born in Saudi and brought up in Hyderabad.

In the making (Pic: Syed Tariq Hussaini)

Operations required to make the device
- Cutting and drilling
- Spot and arc welding
- Turning, fitting and assembling  
- Paint job

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