Metro Plus
Bangalore
Chennai
Coimbatore
Delhi
Hyderabad
Kochi
In a world of aluminium and rats
|
Shaji has been inventing practical solutions to common problems with fair success. PREMA MANMADHAN finds out that he's now engrossed in finding a way to banish Kochiites' Enemy No 1, mosquitoes
|
PHOTO:H. VIBHU
INNOVATIVE Shaji among the products created with his own know-how
The patience to do research is reserved for very few individuals, for the first requirement is a mind willing to undergo hardships and failures. Finance is the next hurdle, and the last, to hold on till results appear and if not, to get on with life, sanity intact. So who has the guts to go do research in a crassly unacademic situation? Shaji has it in abundance, and he has seen a few results too.
Armed Forces
His eight-year stint in the Armed Forces gave him that tenacity of purpose, perhaps and the discipline needed to do things on his own, with no one to set him a target. He served in the Indo-Pakistani war of 1971. He has dabbled in diverse fields of research to come up with prototypes of an aluminium house, rat vanisher as he calls it and different shapes of PET (polyethylene terephthalate) bottles. While serving in the army, his urge to become a technocrat was so great that he left the services and studied Automobile Engineering and Industrial Management, part-time. He did a short-term course in electro-chemistry too.
Electro colour
Shaji first heard of electro colour at a seminar in New Delhi. "From a combination of chemicals, we were the first in India to produce six colours from a single tank by changing the timing and voltage," reminisces Shaji.
He wanted to show the world that aluminium was good enough to build an entire house and tried it out. The roof, walls, doors and pillars, they are all in aluminium and the house, built in 1995 at Thiruvananthapuram, is pretty much in good shape still. This model house is a 350-sq.ft building with bath-attached single bedroom and a large entrance room. What's more, it needs no maintenance.
The aluminium house that he built in 1995, still going strong
"You can build a house in less time using sandwich application with polyurethane and metal sheets. For instance to complete a three-bedroom house it would take only one month."
The creator of perhaps the only all-aluminium-house in India, built in 1995 at his factory premises explains, "Unfortunately, due to the high-cost of polyurethane in India, I made this house with a single layer formed sheet (self-designed) and used the same sheet for roofing and cladding," says Shaji.
Hedesigned a machine to bend commonly used aluminium extrusions and succeeded in making arch and gothic-shaped aluminium products. Shaji has also designed a 780-sq. ft. octagon shaped display house in the European style, which exhibits various models of doors and windows apart from wardrobes and round sitouts. After working in aluminium field for 30 years, he went on to try out something new in the PET bottle sector. "Contrary to the common round bottles, we went for triangle, square and oval shaped bottles as our unique product," says Shaji. With Roop handling Mohanam, Shaji had time to think about his next venture.
'Rat Vanisher'
His latest interest is the `Rat Vanisher,' which is according to him, "the result of 10 long years of research." It is a patented product, which drives away rats from your surroundings for years. "It is not poisonous to animals and human beings," Saji claims. "Just use the solution to soak a piece of cloth and let it lie in the area where rats come. Do it on ten alternate days and the rats would have gone," he says.
After rats what? Lizards! He is currently involved in the final stage of finding a solution to drive away lizards and in the early stages of research to find a solution to stay away from the bites of mosquitoes. Now Kochiites would be awaiting that result, surely. "Any product will last as long as you apply scientific method to manufacture them," says Shaji. He can be contacted at 9349596255 or 1471-2596255
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Metro Plus
Bangalore
Chennai
Coimbatore
Delhi
Hyderabad
Kochi
|
