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There’s a new patent in town.
Area trades instructor Michael Afanasiev was recently awarded a patent for his invention called the Air Conditioner Educational Demonstration System and Method of Operation.
It’s Afanasiev’s eighth patent, with one of his previous patents earned in the U.S. and the other six in the former Soviet Union. He assigned his latest United States patent to Manatee Technical College, the school where he’s an instructor. This is the first time in MTC’s history the school has held a patent.
The invention provides a way to teach the theory of the air conditioning system. Afanasiev tells Coffee Talk he wanted to find a simple, safe way to convey the concepts to students in the school’s air conditioning and refrigeration technology program before they started hands-on work.
He says he’s been thinking about the invention for a long time and built the prototype during one of his winter breaks from classes.
Safety was an important goal. Traditional simulators in the field use Freon, he says, making them dangerous because of the possibility of frostbite — along with hefty Environmental Protection Agency fines if used incorrectly. Instead, Afanasiev’s invention uses nitrogen, allowing students to manipulate the device without worry.
There’s also a cost factor. He says his device costs about $200 to make versus $25,000 to $35,000 for most training simulators used teach the same concepts.
He’s now using the invention in his classes and says students are excited about how quickly they’re able to grasp concepts. “They couldn’t imagine that it would be so simple to understand all the steps,” he says.
Afanasiev wants to make the invention available for other technical schools and high schools, too. In the meantime, Afanasiev is busy — he says he’s always working on new patents.
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