Calculations are extremely important in engineering. They are present in every aspect of our lives, from the basic things like how much load can the chair I’m sitting on withstand, to more complex scenarios such as the exit velocity of the nozzle in a turbojet.
When starting a new project, it is essential to do calculations early on to see whether the idea will work or not. At this stage, we are not looking for precise results. We are just doing quick estimations, to see if the idea will be feasible, looking at the orders of magnitude rather than at the numbers themselves.
As an example, we considered having a turbine on top of the Reid building in the Glasgow School of Art. This turbine would be spun by rainwater, generating electricity. We estimated the parameters and dimensions and calculated that the installation would only generate enough power to light up a bulb. This was quite shocking as I expected it to be a lot more powerful but turned out to be ineffective.
As I realized, this is very important when starting a new project and should be done right at the start, to avoid wasting time and effort on an idea which was predetermined to fail.