Digital Fabrication _ Facade

DATA

Material: Wood

Technique: Tessellation

Percentage: 45%

Translucent Material: Polycarbonate

Percentage: 55%

ABSTRACT

The basic triangular shape poses unique qualities in structural design. A triangle is the simplest geometrc figure that will not change shape when the lengths of the sides are fixed. The triangle does not easily deform and is able to balance the stretching and compressive forces of a structure making it a strong self supportive shape. Combined with tessalation techniques, we evolved the triangle into its pyramidal form for our facade to create a strategical method of light diffusion and deflection. Our facade aims to deflect direct sunlight when it is the strongest and allow and diffuse sunlight when it is soft-

Strategicaly arranged pyramidal forms are arrayed in a repititional pattern so that one or two sides are wood and the remaining side(s) is polycarbonate combined with a unique fastening system which re- quire embedding pins into the polycarbonate’s form.

METHOD

To contruct the facade we have 1 basic tiangular pyramidal formand 2 versions of the form of varying materials. We implemented Rhino software to facilitate and articulate the design before creating sectional prototypes. Once the design was succesful in theory we created a protoype to confirm joinery and construction methods, we proceeded to hand cut the polycarbonate and laser cut the wood. The facade is constructed of 3mm wood and 5mm polycarbonate throughout.The joinery pins consist of 5-6mm wood. After both materials were cut, we proceeded to connect the components using “T-pins” which were then inserted throught the wood and into the structural component of the polycarbonte creating a pyramidal form emphasizing the structural strength elements of the triangular shape.

Fabrication 02 digfab7 laser cutting for wood module panel module Fabrication 01 Fabrication 03 model1