Activity week Diary – Menai – Hayley Chessman

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Monday November 7^th 2016

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After receiving the design brief, and the groups had been addressed, Dr Poorang Piroozfar and Noel Painting gave us a lecture that provided further understanding of basic bridge design and their components.

When meeting with group Menai, we discussed possible ideas and thought of the following:

• A design that was simply executed but also delivered on load performances and the necessary criteria for a safe bridge
• Construction with minimum disturbance to local traffic
• How much of the bridge will be prefabricated?
• Mandatory height of the bridge when dealing with ongoing traffic
• Direct link to buildings?
• The dimensions of the bridge according to the map provided
• Necessary scales of the map and model

There was also a site visit to Mithras where photographs were taken of the purposed site for the bridge. There was an introduction to using the blog and downloading the Edublogs app.

We sat through another lecture kindly held by Dr Pierfrancesco Cacciola, his lecture explained structural design in footbridges.

Before the Hazelwick students left, they were issued their “homework” of design related research and sketches to share with the group for Wednesday.

At the end of the day, after the Hazelwick students left, the rest of the group attended the modelling studio induction where we were shown tools and available materials that can be used during activity week. As well as understanding that there was a £20 limit on any additional materials we required.

I left to go home around 5pm.

 

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Tuesday November 8^th 2016

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After learning that one of the Hazelwick students from our group had dropped out, we had to figure out a way to share design tasks between us. I had brought in several materials as model motivation, this included coloured wooden matchsticks and a bag of basswood in a variety of dimensions suitable for the model.

After Monday’s introduction to activity week, it was on Tuesday that we need to come up with a design that was simple and met the necessary criteria for a safe bridge. This had proven harder said than done as we spent most of the day drawing sketches and running around the university printing off maps that was an appropriate scale to suit the model and fit the board that we would be presenting on.

A trip to the library had proven unsuccessful as I couldn’t find books that related to the brief or on bridge structures. However I had found inspiration via the internet on bridges that we could base our design on. Based on my research, I knew that I wanted the bridge to be constructed from steel and incorporated a roof. The reason why I wanted the bridge to be built in steel were reasons as follows:

• Steel is lighter than concrete for the same load bearing capacity
• Steel can easily be dismantled and moved after its service
• Installation of steel bridges in the field more quickly than with concrete bridges
• Prefabrication of steel in controlled factory conditions leads to a high quality product at minimum cost
• Steel bridges can be installed modular or prefabricated
• Steel has high tensile and compressive strength
• Cost savings can be significant, for instance fast installation
• Structural steel is a high-quality material that is readily available

My roof idea wasn’t taken inconsideration as it would be too complicated to build within the 5 days that we had on the project. However we came up with the following bridge criteria as follows:

 

• A truss steel bridge

• Full Length at 65m
• Full Width at 8m (5m footpath, 1.5m on each side of the footpath to allow for structures)
• There would be a ramp system in three sections of the bridge, this being 5.5m above Lewes Road, 6.5m above Mithras car park and 7m that extends to the entrance of Mithras
• There would a flight of ramps at either side of Lewes Road so that the public don’t have to cross the full length of the bridge
• The model to be a scale of 1:150 and the detail model to be 1:10

 

 

And yes, this took the whole of Tuesday to figure out.

I left to go home around 5pm.

As soon as I got home, I did further research on the actual design of the bridge. I came across many bridges such as:

• Akashi Kaikyo Bridge, Japan

• Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge, China

• Pythonburg, Amsterdam

• Da Vinci Bridge, Norway

 

With those iconic steel bridges, I printed and brought them in to share with group on Wednesday. Some of these bridges that I printed were featured on the poster.

 

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Wednesday November 9^th 2016

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Since many of the other groups had started building their models on Tuesday, it was time for our group to catch up. As said before we were one man down, and I do still believe it affected our project on a time perspective and with the lack of information we held on our final presentation.

As I brought in the materials, it was my job to measure up, sand and cut out the basswood for the “steel” platforms, the “steel” bridge columns and the “steel” ramps, while I had help from a Hazelwick student to measure and cut the trusses that would later sandwich between two platforms on each section (three sections of the bridge that ramps at the heights of 5.5m, 6.5m and 7m). While the other Hazelwick student started the detailed sketches later used for the poster.

I had spent most of the day cutting, sanding and measuring the bridge components and after the Hazlewick students left, I made a quick trip to B&Q to get silver spray paint to represent the steel bridge, while the other group members started work on the poster.

I left to go home around 5pm.

 

 

 

 

 

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Thursday November 10^th 2016

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It was my birthday as well as activity week, and as much as I wanted to take the day off I had to come in and continue my duties to the project.

My group members came in around 11am while I was in at 9am, I was set a task of measuring the topography of the area on our map to fit the scale of our model. I soon realised that the Mithras building we originally wanted to incorporate on the board was cut out from the map, so I needed to rethink about the topography that will be included on our map.  Working out the foam block to fit the scale and cut it out had taken most of the morning, but seeing the final result was definitely worthwhile.

After the other two group members had arrived and the topography was complete, they worked on constructing the components of the bridge (that I had prepared on Wednesday). I was later set a new task of working on the structural detail. It was decided that the detail would represent the ramp connection between the levels 5.5m and 6.5m.  I followed the sketch that was provide to me and set to work on building.

There was still enough time to continue working in the modelling studio before it was closed for the night. I was given another task to figure out a way to construct a flight of ramps that would connect on either side of Lewes Road. I yet again obeyed orders from my group leader and followed the rough sketches provided to build the ramps, while the group leader put finishing touches to the detailed model. There wasn’t enough time as planned to spray paint both models, so I agreed to come in early to spray them.

 

I left to go home around 6:30pm.

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Friday November 11^th 2016

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I arrived early as promised to finish gluing the ramps and spray paint the 1:150 scale bridge and the 1:10 scale structural detail. We later discovered that ramps I made from the sketches given to me did don’t fit the bridge; one of many disasters to come.  I quickly aided the Hazelwick students on sticking the trees on our map and brought the complete board to the presentation room where we started to set up.

 

 

At this point I was told that we have 15minutes to present our projects. I was unaware and underprepared that we had to present and do a 15minute speech on our final design.  To make matters worse we had to go first. Our group struggled to last the full 15 minutes and had not provided the necessary information to sell our project. I was still completely baffled by the idea of speaking in front of the class on information I had not prepared for and was also oblivious to the fact we had to include case studies and evaluate them. The only thing I could contribute to the 15 minute speech was the fact that I provided all the materials and put the model together, as well as slip in a curse word, which was very unprofessional of me. I still regret that major mistake!

 

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Reflection

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Activity week had been challenging, I did underestimate how much extra work needed to be put in, for example doing additional research on case studies would of massively improved the performance of our presentation and researching building regulations to see if our bridge heights met the required standards. However maybe if we did not lose a group member we would have had made up for the lack of information provided on the presentation?

I did not work on the poster, but if there was enough time I could of proof read for any spelling mistakes that were picked up on during the presentation. I could have possibly asked other groups how they were going to layout their poster. Our group wasn’t made aware that we could have used Microsoft PowerPoint for our poster, so ours were done by hand.

Having better organisation within the group tasks, the tasks given to me meant that I took on most of the labour from the construction of the models by myself and did additional bridge design research in the early stages of the week. Also, on the days when the Hazelwick students were off, why did it require two people to work on the poster, or two people to build the bridge? When that time from the group member assisting could be spent researching case studies and regulations, especially since we had less people.

I learnt that I should thoroughly read the design brief in case of critical missed information, hence the 15minute speech presentation and the case studies I was unaware of. Would this mean not relying on my team leader to provide information on the tasks? Or should I have also consulted with other team leaders to make a checklist completed and uncompleted tasks?

With all the negatives said, having a missing member did our progression through the week, I definitely listen and worked with every job assigned to me by my group leader. We did rush towards the final days till presenting but we did manage to get “everything” done within the week. I still very much like our bridge design and model, it had so much potential to be marvellous final product, to imagine the outcome of the project and model, if only we had better time management and organization!

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Hayley Chessman

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