petebooth[iaac]

Now that Shane and I repaired the milling machine it gave the last 9 groups the opportunity to mill their 3rd assignment for Digital Tools and Fabrication from last semester.

Maria and I jumped at the chance, being the first of the nine to mill our ripple on the sheet. We had to change our setting slightly as the tool bit that we wanted to use was not in the lab, so after a few adjustments were made we were milling away fantastically.

You can find all of our cad work in our previous post here.

you can download our final PDF presentation here

Our group was assigned rotational input and light output for our electronics assignment. In addition to this we also ended up with 11 people in our group somehow. We got off to a great start with the milling, and chip making, but eventually we had a few problems with the milling, resulting with a nice little groove cut into the bed of the machine (we already told Vicotor about this and it wasn’t our fault).

watch a movie of the final panel in action here at youtube

Krzys hard at work with the chip making.

We decided for the panel that it would be much nicer if the actual object that you controlled was the object that changed, so we devised a series of 8×8x8cm cubes that would contain the electronic components.

These 9 cubes were mounted on a large base board, allowing the sensor to be fixed and the cubes to rotate. Many long discussion were fought about the layout of the cubes, but ultimately we decided that a fairly regular pattern would suit the project better.

Upon completion we managed to have 7 cubes working perfectly, 1 that is constantly on and one that has now chip at all. In addition to the 5 chips that we managed to destroy during the production process somehow. Victor had a look at these and apparently they look perfect, but just won’t work.

The panel its self allows you to vary the rate at which the light blinks by the amount that you rotate the cubes.

For our CNC milling assignment we based out design on mirrore, radiating curves. This would provide a great variation between surface finished from one end of the piece to the other. The detail below shows connection curves outside the material boundary, joining all of the line together in order to maximize milling efficiency. To add further detail to the surface, one set of lines was elevated 1mm above the finished level while the opposing set were left directly on the finished level.

engraving lines and detail.

rough cut.

We reduced the rough cut levels in order to remove excess material as close to the finished surface as possible. Even with these settings, flat sections are still visible.

Engraving cut.

The lines that we created in AutoCAD were used as engraving paths, in 2 continuous passes.

This work was not able to be finished due the CNC machine technical problems.

Based upon 3-dimensional “cellular automata”, m.any displays the concept and prototypical realization of a complete digital work flow from parametric design to production on CNC-machines. An irregular spatial structure generated by algorithms was controlled and manipulated through an especially developed software. In addition to the calculation of the complex geometry, the software also generated necessary parametrical construction elements for the realization.

java generation of form

A masters project for a group of postgraduate students of Computer Aided Design (CAAD) at ETH Zurich, Switzerland, m.any was realized during a three month period. Intertwined with the programming process, construction studies and fabrication systems were developed. Using construction data directly derived from the 3D-model, m.any variations could be explored and tested. Using a combination of JAVA and RhinoScript, the group were able to generate, test and prototype the design process ensuring that it met the assessment criteria. 3D printed models were created during initial visualizations, followed by laser-cut, component based models.

rhino3d generation and 3d printer tests.

The final and realized spatial structure consists out of 1500 individual parts all generated and produced in a seamless digital workflow. 111 main assembly frames were CNC milled, and precisely 1368 MDF connection pieces were laser-cut. In total 34 hours were spent in the workshop cutting all of the pieces, in addition to 16 hours of installation and construction time within the gallery.

rhino3d layout of cutting paths.

fabrication and assembly

The project represents a quite remarkable fusion of two different CNC techniques, highlighting the different capacities of each of the two machines.

The Rip Curl Canyon, by Benjamin Ball and Gaston Nogues, consists of around 4000 sheets of cardboard and is intended to transform the way people understand and interact with the spaces they inhabit. Throughout the exhibition, at Huston’s Rice Gallery 2006, visitors were encouraged to climb on and around the installation, in order to truly experience the change the object produces in the gallery’s space.

The 4000 sheets of cardboard were industrial die-cut into over 20,000 curved strips during a 12 day period. when joined together, these laminated strips act as a semi-monocoque with an intermediate plywood armature. The armature is constructed of 90×45mm timber and plywood which were individually CNC routered to fit the curvature from the 3D model.

A specific language was developed to allow the pieces to be slotted together, allowing the vast quantity of pieces to be installed within 4 days. This system allowed for very little structural constraint and gave on-site freedom to make improvised choices when installing the cardboard.

The digital information from CAD software and the cut-outlines

on site installation process, including die-cut template

installation completed in gallery

Is it possible to find a solution in which everyone can generate their own custom prefabricated house?
As more advanced levels of digital technology are incorporated into housing design, we will begin to see a prefabricated house that is truly unique. Through the utilization of mass-production and digital fabrication techniques, a customised prefabricated house could be entirely unique, designed specifically for an occupants needs. In turn this offers personalized, unique and affordable house that would be available to the general public, making architecture more accessible.

Our map focuses on opportunities for future development of cultural shopping. Cultural hotspots have been identified within the old-city, providing an underlying base for existing cultural activity. Three and six minute walking radii have been calculated from each of these hotsposts, with MACBA receiving an additional nine minute radius as it offers an emerging cultural precinct.

Areas of greater colour intensity offer a better prospect of developing new cultural shopping environments. Metro stations are shaded blue and when overlapping with cultural hotsposts, offer possible magnification of success.

download the screen resolution JPEG here.
download the print quality PDF here (not suitable for digital presentation)

As a par tof our readings class, I set up a wiki-site to allow the students to add and collaborate all of their words (10 each) defining what they see as emergent culture.

The site turned into somewhat of a beast, now containing over 600 words. I was joined by 8 other students and we completed a blanket editing process in which we formatted each of the words in a similar manner and added some very important modules that all for site list automation.

iaac emergent culture glossary

You can view the words either alphabetically, by family, by student, or by ranking via the drop-down word list tab at the top of the page. Please feel free to browse the site and cast your vote for your favorite word/s (membership rquired).

Here are a few images of the test model that Joe and I created for our tree project.  It is the first test, and is very rough, Printed on thick paper, cut by hand and used a whole lot of magic tape!

I have just finished the dwg file for the laser cutter tomorrow, so there will be some more pictures of a much more refined version of this form in very pretty transparent plastic.