Crisis Day!!

Lesson Learnt!
We have encountered some problems throughout this project and we have slowly learnt how to come together as a group to solve these issues. One of our major flaws within the group was the lack of communication. Erin thankfully had links to a company who could help support us in the form of sponsorship, however due to our poor communication skills our relationship with the company was put under strain and this became a  problem when it came to placing an order with them. When we were faced with problems in the design, for example the scale, detailing, sourcing and pricing, we were forced to change and edit our order which meant then going to the company with a new order. On our part this is very un-professional looking, and the company were understandably becoming very impatient with our constant order changing.

Fundraising
There was a raffle held in Art Bar with the Sine group - from which we earned £115. Chas and Ellie met with the manager of Liquid and organised a social event to be held in Liquid Envy. We are now faced with selling 200 tickets! We divided the tickets between us - ten each - and aim to sell them to a wider circle of people rather than within the architects. Hannah and Jemma made plans to make and sell chocolate and toffee apples and pumpkin soup in spirit of halloween.

Documentation
Amy and Charli worked on the presentation for our final review on the project. They made a wooden booklet with three books: one demonstrating drawings and design, the second showing the process and the third, the final thing.

Problems and Solutions
Working out sheet metal for the roof area - we ordered more than was perhaps needed to compensate for the crimping which would increase the surface area significantly.

Type of wood and treatment. Whitewood pine for the frame - already treated.

Measuring the lengths of cladding and working out the ratio of larch and cedar. Eimear decided on 2/3 larch and 1/3 cedar to make an attempt at keeping the price down.

5mm thick Metal plates - changed to washers.

Back to the drawing board...

The team today were working on another redesign! After a consultation with the tutors some issues were raised, the structure of the roof seemed to be the most difficult thing to work out. There was much debate between Nathan and Jerry, to everyone's amusement. Another serious issue was the scale of the design, with a maximum height of 4.5m and a roof spanning 6m - the whole project had to be scaled down. This meant redesigning, redrawing, remeasuring and holding off on finalising the order with the timber merchants, sorry Erin!

James designated people to work on the roof and wall construction alongside Alex Pearson to come to a conclusion about the foundations and roof structure. The design of the roof has changed due to the fact that the angles don't fit snugly to ensure a flat roof that sits flush against the supporting walls. Eimear, our saviour,  therefore suggested a butterfly roof to solve this problem which meant more structure to get our teeth into. Nathan worked like crazy on the sketchup model and Stuart made new models of the roof whilst Mark, Mike and Joe built a new mock-up of one triangular frame at scale 1:1 which we had lots of fun with testing the cladding strength by jumping on it.

Our saving grace

The roof takes the shape of a folding rhombus and will be structured using a bow-string truss along the spine with struts coming off to support the cladding. Its all getting very exciting, everyone is eager to get stuck in and started with the construction.

The roof at the moment.....

Construction

Today the construction team worked in the workshop building mock-ups of the jointing of each triangular component. We constructed several models showing different fittings to explore the best way to build the final piece. There was much debate and took a while to agree on all the fixings. We worked out that the triangular models will hold with screws and glue as they are not under as much pressure as the rectangular frame. To fit each of the triangular and rectangular frames together the group will use coach bolts for extra stability. The aesthetic of the fixings was a big decision and required a lot of trial runs with spare bits of wood. Mark made a dovetail joint whilst Joe and Mike worked on the triangular angles and took note of all the angle measurements. Lyle showed us a quick and effective way to cut the angles all at once, so we estimate that the frame could be cut in a single afternoon. We can then construct it in pieces and take to the site when ready. Thanks Lyle!

Designers


Nathan had been working closely with Eimear to redesign parts of the roof.  It was drawn up and Stuart discussed it with Lyle. There could be a few problems in putting this together due to the thickness of the timber posts. Therefore we have to try a few more mock-ups test the stability and perhaps re-order some timber with thicker dimensions to fit the new design.

Eimear and Steph visited the site to mark out exactly where the concrete is to be poured and the first structural posts to be placed. Nathan printed out drawings of the sketchup model and some elevations to allow the entire group access to such information.

Fundraisers
The group sold more cakes today and prepared for the open-mic night at the social in the evening. Fundraising team had been writing letters to bars, getting sponsorship and trying to organise a raffle night with the art bar to raise more money for the build. Nathan stole the show and helped get lots of donations, not to mention his lovely rendition of "foxy lady" dedicated to all the girls in the room .... awww shucks!

Documentation

Some of the group scanned in images and information to document in this blog and a scrapbook filled with information on the process. There are to be two completed articles - a full book of every part of the process and design stages and a finalised version for presentation. The design of this book is being managed by Charli and Amy and is to include some animation techniques to bring a different slant to our project from previous years work. Video documentation is another part of recording or process, we borrowed camcorders from Hugh and Keri has organised some tuition with Richy on video editing so that we can have all the resources to hand at creating a personalised piece of footage explainging our project.

INITIAL DESIGN CONCEPTS

CONSTRUCTION TEAM

The construction team have got stuck in today with lots of debate over the different methods of construction we can look at. After discussions over bolting the entire frame or tapping and gluing it together we visited the workshop guru, Lyle, in the workshop for advice. For some reason the suggestion that we "UHU the crap out of it" wasn't met with too many smiles....

Lyle picked out the spike foundation as the easiest solution to our foundation problems. We could build these for the prototype and then used concrete point foundation for the real thing. We worked out a list of all the things that had still to be figured out, it was a very long list.....

Lyle suggested that we consider the frame without intricate joints, assuring us that it would still be structurally sound. With Eimear breathing down our necks about the aesthetic of the shelter it was a welcome solution. Simple butt joints attached with coach screws seemed to be a cheap solution which achieves good stability whilst maintaining the flush finish.

A cordless drill to take to the site was enthusiastically requested by the boys of the group, this meant dipping into the kitty, Erin put up a fight. We decided that the best option would be to prefabricate elements of the frame, making it easier to construct on site. 

Back to Lyle and approved! So from here we researched the type of rods and found that M24 was the best to use. We would drill them into the timber posts and concrete slabs and fill with resin to secure tightly. The rods are also threaded with nylon sheeted bolts for extra stabilty. The rods will cost approximately £80 in total.

Tomorrow's tasks include ordering our timber and buying concrete. The concrete will need to be measured out and placed on site accurately to ensure that when the frame is fitted at a later stage it will fit snugly. The concrete will take a few days to completely set, however it is build able on after 24 hours. During this time we plan to cut and construct the frame and cladding - take this to site and piece it all together. All that's left to do is get a good night's sleep!

Fund-raising Team

The team had a cake sale today! We made a profit of £60 and intend to have another tomorrow. Amy Sleight who was selling the cakes said she was 'very satisfied with today's profits. However [she doesn't] think we should be selling fudging cakes everyday.'

Hannah and Jemma went around as many bars in the area as possible to look for sponsorship and got a great response from many places. All that remains to be done is send formal letters.

Shelter Logo

Hey guys this is the initial logo for the point shelter. It can change and develop further throughout the next few weeks. I also have a few simplified versions that i can make stencils from and hopefully go around and spraypaint some grafitti logos around campus.

cheers