George Hart Monday 9/11/15

During the first day of the design week, we all got put into groups. Our group consisted of 3 university students, myself, Jake and Rob, 1 Chichester called Paul, and 2 Hazelwood students, Dane, Lennard. Rob was our group leader.

The first part of the day consisted of talking to the client, and making sure we understood his brief. After explaining, we was allowed to ask questions to help solve any problems. An example of this was Rob asking about the size of the trailer due to it not being specifically explained in the brief.

After the break we had a lecture which spoke about a number of different aspects of using a shipping container, with the main reason being its the cheapest. He went into detail about the different problems with ventilation, insulation, height, darkness ect. He also told us the different sizes and price of using a shipping container. Once the lecture had finished we had a group talk about if we should yous the container as our main structure.

Following  lunch we had another lecture with Noel Paintings who showed a number of precedence studies and help give us an insight into how we could design our eco-cabin. Half way through he stopped the lecture to allow for us to discuss a design of using the shipping container which we all agreed to use. One big problem when looking at the design of this building was creating enough space for all the services as well as a big enough space for people to live. The figures below shows some of the floor plan designs we came up with.

The second figure shows a different option we looked at when designing the shipping container. We looked at using multiple units with one just for services. In the figure it would of been the middle one which would then create a lot more space inside the other containers. Another method which is slightly shown in the first figure was opening a side up. By doing this would create a weakness in the structure and therefore had to look at different supports we could use to help support and strengthen.

At the end of the first day we concluded the best design to create maximum space as well as what materials we could use. We all then gave each other tasks for the next day:

Lennard & Dane – Looking into different energy saving equipment & sustainable materials

Paul – Starting the basic model and structure

Myself – Drawing up a clear floor plan and looking into different space saving furniture.

Jake – Research into different materials as well as factoring in the cost

Rob –  Downloading CADD drawing of shipping container

Finally we all arranged a meeting time via facetime during