Results and Discussion of Initial Experiments

These are the results of the first several experiments run, with the initial experimental setup.

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From the results collected, there were conflicting data on which sand depth was the optimal. At previous runs, the data showed that the sand depth of 10cm was the optimal. However, in the most recent runs, the data indicated that the sand depth of 33 cm out performed the depth of 10cm. This may be due to how the experiments were run. In the previous runs, the larger sand depth was run first and then the shorter sand depth was run after the longer sand depth. There was a period of rest to vacuum the sand out of the column. However, between the experiments, bubbles remained on the top of sand filter from the previous run. These bubbles settlement may have contributed the error in the data collected. In the most current runs, the short depth was run before the longer sand depth. From the data collect, no concrete conclusion could be drawn and more data was needed.

Conclusion

We have not yet drawn any final conclusions. We would be able to analyze the system better when most of the problems of the system are fixed and it was improved. The current results collected were not promising and stable. This was due to many problems, such as the DO probe not reading the concentration correctly.