Individual Contribution and Assessment

First 8 weeks of work:

Most of my work in this time has been recorded and uploaded to an earlier entry in my blog:

• Individual Milestone Submission

Rest of  Semester Work:

The rest of the semester involved receiving tasks from our client Hank and delegating certain sections to each team member to complete. The first few weeks involved converting some of his hand drawings into computerised section drawings in AutoCAD.

The first initial drawings and his sketches can be found in the Individual Milestone Submission link.

Section Details

The following are updates of the sections that I had received to complete:

Section 2)

Hank Sketch

Initial CAD Drawing

Added Annotations

Included Roof Pitch after review by Hank

Inserted the 1mm thick Silicon gap between the wood, PV Cell and Acrylic.

Section 6a)

Initial Hank Sketch

Initial CAD Drawing

Initial CAD Drawing

These initial interpretations of Hanks drawings were found to be incorrect. The following CAD Drawings are the fixed versions in compliance with Hanks wishes.

Initial CAD Re Draw

Added Components

Added Roof Pitch

Created gap for cap screw to fit in

 

Initial Variant - Lengthen the angle bracken for added stability

Added annotations

Variant - included roof pitch

Initial 30 x 60 Minitec Profile in Section

Added roof pitch and 1mm gaps around cap screws

Added the cut out for the cap screw to fit

Timelapse outlining work:

The video is made using Chronolapse captures of my work creating the many variations of my Section 2 and 6a Details.

These variations included:

• 30mm x 30mm Minitec Profile
• 30mm x 60mm Minitec Profile
• Angle Brackets
• Nuts and Cap Screw arrangements
• Various 1mm gaps
• Roof Pitch

The video also includes parts in which I researched the Minitec website and found the plans and details to correctly use in the section details. This meant that the sections were totally correctly and ready for the model making phase.

It also contains parts where I was on Facebook keeping in contact with Jason Lo who I was working with on Section 6. This allowed us to transfer files between us and create our individual parts for the presentations.

Timelapse outlining CAD to Laser Cut File (Illustrator):

Section 2

Section 11

Laser Cut Files:

Settings:

• 0.025 point line weighting
• RGB Red (R=255, G=0, B=0)

Section 2

Plywood 3mm Thickness

Needs to be cut 3 times in order to create a model of 3 x 15mm sections.

Section 6a

Plywood 3mm Thickness

Needs to be cut 8 times in order to create a model of 3 x 15mm sections.

Section 11

Only created to help Darren as he didn't have illustrator on his computer.

MDF 3mm Thickness

Needed to be cut 5 times in order to create a model of 3 x 15mm sections.

Laser Cuting Of Models:

The beginning of the video contains me going through selecting appropriate settings for the laser cutting machine. I set the power at 100% and the speed at 5% in order to cut through the material properly.

In previous sheets the laser didn't always cut straight through. This was partly due to the fact that the material we were using was plywood and sometimes it can be a warped piece. This causes the point of the laser to not be set correctly as it moves around the sheet, causing it to not cut completely through.

The slowing of the speed worked at cut through all 3mm sheets perfectly.

Laser Cut Models:

Section 2

Constructed and Laser Cut by me, using my AutoCAD File.

Section 6

 Constructed and laser cut by Jason Lo, making use of my AutoCAD files.

Wiki Spaces Contribution:

As part of my Wiki Spaces contribution I uploaded all my files and images of the work I had contributed to the group.

Files such as those for Section 6 were already uploaded by Jason as he had been working on them to laser cut the model.

Bus Stop Calculations:

After the week 13 group presentations we had a group meeting at ARUP Engineering with our Client Hank and 3 of their engineering employees.

After the meeting they asked us if we could finalise some calculations of the bus stop such as weight and connections.

I took it upon myself to get these calculations started by using George and Michael's 15mm sheet Bus Stop Revit File to create new sections and dimensioning.

I used this to calculate things such as:

• Minitec Framing Lengths
• Minitec Framing Weight
• Number of Sheets
• Number of Connections
• What is in each connection
• etc

The following is what I have managed to achieve before the final submission:

The work contains images gathered from the research i did on the Minitec Website including finding the correct components and their weights.

Files For Download

The following folder link contains the updated Revit file that I used. It also all files that were used to present evidence of work in the blog as well as containing the word document of the calculations above:

Individual Submission Files Dropbox Folder

Week 13 Group Presentations

Bus Stop of the Future Wikispace

Weekly Progress 12

This week again involved meeting with Hank to finalise any questions. This meeting was also our last before our final group presentation.

He outlined that he wanted finalised section drawings as well as 1:1 models of those sections.

Sections that I had been working on since the last individual submission were sections 2 and 6.

The placement of these section are outlined as shown below in the figure:

Due to the fact that Section 6a and 6b were similar I decided to work with Jason Lo (who did section 6b) in order to create an in depth physical model.

6a and 6b section drawing by Hank (very similar):

I went about working on finalising the section 6 detail way past what was expected of hank. I placed the mintec profile in the correct place with the correct dimensions of 30mm x 30mm. I also added the screws, bolts, nuts and angle connector that would all be used in conjunction to connect the roof and back wall together.

The video below is the proof of progress:

Weekly Progress 11

This week involved another meeting with Hank. He reviewed all our section details and outlined what was wrong or needed for each detail to be finalised. He also asked some of us to work on various unfinished details of the bus stop such as:

• the sliding door mechanism
• Minitec frame built into bus stop
• connections between roof and back wall

Week 11 Presentations: Remuneration

Group:
The Last Suprematist

Members:
Joshua Nicholson, Anders Huxtable

Presentation Analysis:
Remuneration is the compensation one receives from work. Therefore the most common form of remuneration is a wage or payment. 
This presentation was probably the most engaging and well prepared one of them all. Both of the members spoke clearly and worked off of each other to convey their research effectively. They relied on no scripts or notes and made constant interaction with their powerpoint slides.

Their use of graphics such as tables, charts and graphs displays the amount of research and depth they delved into to create the presentation.

They outlined the advantages and disadvantages of being employed by a business or being a freelancer. These include differences in pay, stability, work lengths, time, stress, etc.

Factors that affected remuneration include:

• Experience
• Business Size
• Individual Standards
• Complexity of Job
• Job Position
• Location

They also include an image of a typical invoice outlining how to complete one in order to receive payment. 

They introduced the class to an app known as the time doctor which enables users to keep track of hours worked, in order for correct payment per hour to be logged. They also rationalised wages and payments through calculations throughout the presentation.

In terms of the relation to their own project, they worked out how much money they would get paid for the completion of their project. The calculated wages per hour and then calculated it for the length of time on the project, resulting in $7000 worth of work.

Relation to our group:

The Bus Stop of the Future Group is working towards receiving a final grade attributed to completing their degree of Architectural Computing. As a result in this case remuneration is not quite the exchange of payment, rather a grading as the payment, being a direct result of the quality of work.

Yet remuneration in terms of payment can become a case after our semester has finished. One of the early details we figured out while working on this project was the final physical model was not due till August. This created a problem as the subject finishes in early June.

As a result we would either complete our semester and leave the project to Hank and any new workers, or continue our work.

One of the obvious issues with continuing the work without it attributing to your degree is that there is no incentive. It's obviously a good project to lay claim to when trying to attain future jobs and is a good experience. This is an issues where remuneration can be slightly changed.

• We could ask Hank to pay us to help him complete the work in areas such as cnc routing
• Finish our work at the end of semester
• Continue to gain valuable experience
• Ask for recognition of your work in the project in the final submission

These are all valuable outcomes to the problem the group is facing. Most of us are leaning to points in which we would continue to gain experience but also want some line of recognition in the final submission, so we can claim we worked on a large project for our portfolios. Another important factor is that Hank can supply us with vouchers from the 20,000 budget, meaning we don't have to spend our own money to create models, giving us an incentive to continue on in the project.

Week 10 Presentations: Conflict

Group:
Aerial Ropeway

Members:
Shaun Taylor, Paul Chew, Roschelle Gonzales, Reina Bautista, Eugelyn Corre, Jesharelah Yolola.

Presentation Analysis:
One of the main points that the group brought up was that people can lose sight of the fundamentals of communication leading to conflict between members.
They outlined the various conflict types including:

• Background/Gender
• Leadership
• Personality Clashes
• Style and Skill Sets
• Different Goals & Expectations

The groups presentation went into depth on these conflict types, outlining how they effect the group and what that conflict leads to. 

Some critical feedback is that the slides were too content heavy in sections, making it difficult to read. Group members were reading off slides, communicating the fact that they maybe had not completely prepared for the presentation.

The final video was very entertaining. The role-playing was an affective way of engaging the class. The scenarios of the video correlated with the conflict types which was very well though out. 

Russell also pointed out the fact that they had outlined resolutions to the differing conflict types, displaying their thorough research into their topic.

Group:
The Last Suprematist

Members: 
Benjamin Kalgovas, Daming Yan, Molly Wu

Presentation Analysis:
Their presentation lacked the same effect as the previous group.
They just outlined the conflict types without really going in depth.
They were very hard to hear and Daming and Molly read off of their pre-prepared sheets. Ben compensated for this by projecting his voice very well and clearing up any confusion caused by the presentation. There was barely any eye contact from the group causing much of the class to loose interest. 

The positive was that the slides contained the right amount of information allowing them not to became too content heavy.

The video was a redeeming feature of the presentation. Again they made use of scenarios that they had presented earlier. It was well put together and was a good way to finish off the presentation.



Relation to our group:
In relation to our group there weren't any instances of conflict between the members. The hierarchy we created within the first meeting help to distinguish how we each went about our roles.
Anthony being the team leader would set up goals for work to be completed as well as contacting our clients to receive and delegate any new work.
Martha was set up as the documenter as well as being a roving helper. This role helped the group to figure out any problems in terms of misinterpretation. The notes taken down in each meeting were a valuable source of reducing conflict to virtually zero.
Darren, Kerre and I were set as the main researchers of info, and once collected, would present it to both Martha and Anthony in order to collate it into presentable work for our client Hank and lecturer Russell.

Thee methods helped to keep conflict down to small discussions in which individual people were wanting to forward their own idea, which is actually a valuable part of group work - people explaining their ideas in great detail and defending them in order for the group to mutually agree on the final outcome.

Some sources of possible conflict as highlighted by the groups is the amount of dedication and effort put in by individual members. This can further be affected by where we all live, work arrangements and personal instances - in that it is difficult for all to meet as a group, especially at uni due to members having differently planned out schedules. The group managed to negate this in part due to modern technology. The improvement of areas such as the Internet as well as social collaboration and online storage helped the group immensely. We would communicate on social media websites to set up times in which the majority could make it and then post the work up onto online storage spaces for all to access, thus ensuring no one had any excuse not to know what was expected by the next meeting. This would allow members to work on tasks in their own times and still contribute to the group.

Weekly Progress 10

This week we finally got news of the actual bus stop design we would be working on.

We knew Eliot had been working on a parametric bus stop model in Rhino and Grasshopper since the beginning of the semester but we imagined it was only to be able to change dimensions of the original design we had been given to suite all rules and regulations.

We were quite surprised when the files he sent us contained a completely new design.

From This:

To This:

Despite this, the details we had been working on would fit any design so we could continue working on with no obstructions.