The Sea Sweeper 1000
Lainey's ingenious invention tackles several environmental issues. It harnesses wave energy to create and store energy but it also collects refuse from the ocean, all the while being careful not to harm or scare sea life through its fish design and built-in sensors.
Keep scrolling to see the story of this amazing invention!
Invention Story
"It's a robot fish that collects all the litter from the sea. Inside, it burns rubbish to keep it going. It also collects movement energy from the waves and fish from the fins. Humans control the robot fish. It has sensors so no fish are harmed."
Lainey
.jpg "Preston park sea sweeper 1000")
Lainey created an even more detailed drawing of her invention The Sea Sweeper 1000 at the first Pioneer session at Preston Park Museum.
Lainey was inspired after watching David Attenborough and Blue Planet and she wanted to help. She represents her ideas through wonderful drawings with great artistic flair.
Lainey has been inventing at home, exploring great ideas like this dog harness and getting feedback from other people to help her shape her inventions.
We love the work that Lainey has done making this fantastic moving model.
Lainey and her teacher met with Lottie Smith on a video call and Lottie showed Lainey how her invention had been brought to life and the different features of the model.
Initial Ideas
"Absolutely loved this idea from Lainey. Our oceans, seas and rivers could really do with such a useful invention and the wonderfully detailed and well thought out drawing sparked a lot of ideas. I really like how the Sea Sweeper 1000 has potential to come in lots of different sizes and shapes too, maybe as big as a whale for somewhere like the Great Pacific garbage patch or a tiny little Pufferfish to collect microplastics on coral reefs.
Here are some drawings that I've made after studying Lainey’s idea that explain a little more how I think the invention would work."
Rubbish recycler
The idea has so many useful applications.
It's a clever thought to power the Sea Sweeper by burning the rubbish it collects but I was thinking that perhaps there's so much rubbish in the sea that it might not even need that much energy to swim about!
So rather than waste extra energy I've been thinking about how the Sea Sweeper could collect and also sort the rubbish. Any items that are recyclable could be stored and brought back to be recycled.
Final touches
You could also use these trips back to land to make any essential repairs and insure it doesn't break down deep in the ocean and become floating rubbish itself! This is how the remote control to activate the Sea Sweeper 1000 could look like and work.
Using the Inventor's Log, Lainey has planned out her exhibition and we want to come! She's decided to hold it at the beach which is perfect for her invention. See her brilliant timeline and exhibition poster.
We love Lainey's idea to invite Sir David Attenborough to attend her exhibition, that's perfect as he provided some of the inspiration in the first place!
The final creation! What a great idea and a great collaboration between Little Inventor Lainey and expert cardboard artist Lottie Smith.
Lainey's idea was inspiring on so many levels. Her care for the environment and how to layer ideas are impressive as is her artistic talent, and we can't wait to see what else she comes up with!
