Tuesday, September 30, 2014
Flashlight Resources and Research
As we delve into our next ID1 project, the first step is to do copious amounts of research for what you're designing for. Here's what I found:
-The Current Prospective Market:
http://www.keenboy.com/news.php?id=249
-What real user's opinions of flashlights are:
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?264096-What-do-you-mostly-use-your-flashlight-for
-Flashlight FAQs:
http://www.eveready.com/faqs/lighting-products/Pages/faq.aspx
-And a Mintel report about battery use currently in the US.
Because research is important!
-RM
-The Current Prospective Market:
http://www.keenboy.com/news.php?id=249
-What real user's opinions of flashlights are:
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?264096-What-do-you-mostly-use-your-flashlight-for
-Flashlight FAQs:
http://www.eveready.com/faqs/lighting-products/Pages/faq.aspx
-And a Mintel report about battery use currently in the US.
Because research is important!
-RM
Monday, September 29, 2014
A. Zahner Field Trip!!!
A. Zahner is a metal fabricator in KC that has been there for 116 years. They work in all metals, but not with composits, and they use various types of machinery. They fabricate structures for anyone who happens to need their services, but usually for businesses, museums, and occasionally the government. They are know internationally for their metalwork, and have created structures all over the world. Some of the jobs they have worked on include the 9/11 memorial, various Frank Gehry buildings, the Cooper Union in New York, and the Peterson Automotive Museum in Miami, FL.
Their machines include a Press Punch (which is patented by them) to cut holes and shapes into metal, a water jet which provides 3000 psi and can cut through 6 inch steel, shears, a bridge mill, routers/cutters, and various others. A lot of R&D happens at the KC facility, but we were told there is also a facility in Dallas, Texas, which is mostly for production. Also, in Texas, they have a bead blaster to use on surfaces of metals that uses glass beads. Generally, we were told they try to stay away from paints when it comes to surfacing their metals, but sometimes its required. When they work with clients, the jobs they take on can take from months to years, depending on the design process and the client's needs.
Thanks to A. Zahner for allowing our class to view their facility, and to May for setting up the field trip!
-RM
Their machines include a Press Punch (which is patented by them) to cut holes and shapes into metal, a water jet which provides 3000 psi and can cut through 6 inch steel, shears, a bridge mill, routers/cutters, and various others. A lot of R&D happens at the KC facility, but we were told there is also a facility in Dallas, Texas, which is mostly for production. Also, in Texas, they have a bead blaster to use on surfaces of metals that uses glass beads. Generally, we were told they try to stay away from paints when it comes to surfacing their metals, but sometimes its required. When they work with clients, the jobs they take on can take from months to years, depending on the design process and the client's needs.
Thanks to A. Zahner for allowing our class to view their facility, and to May for setting up the field trip!
-RM
Sketches of Frank Gehry Reflection
"Is starting hard? You know it is."-Frank Gehry
Frank Gehry is an architect and an artist who fabricates impossibly organic buildings out of stereotypically industrial materials. He has designed many buildings as well as houses for buyers of all sorts, including museums, private buyers, businesses, and companies. He designed the Vitra Furniture Museum as well as the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain. Frank goes through a very particular design process, and he works in glass and metals. He is part of the process 100%, and usually his designs require thinking around the parameters of the materials.
Frsnk Gehry seems to be such a character. He said something along the lines of his building design looking so stupid it worked. When asked about it, he replied something like 'yeah, stupid', but in a more positive tone than the word usually commands. His approach to buildings is so out of the box, I can hardly follow it, but his question, "So how do you make a building human?" is a great question to apply to anything you're designing. If a product becomes humanistic, it becomes relatable, and thus the people who are using it understand and appreciate it more.
-RM
Frank Gehry is an architect and an artist who fabricates impossibly organic buildings out of stereotypically industrial materials. He has designed many buildings as well as houses for buyers of all sorts, including museums, private buyers, businesses, and companies. He designed the Vitra Furniture Museum as well as the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain. Frank goes through a very particular design process, and he works in glass and metals. He is part of the process 100%, and usually his designs require thinking around the parameters of the materials.
Frsnk Gehry seems to be such a character. He said something along the lines of his building design looking so stupid it worked. When asked about it, he replied something like 'yeah, stupid', but in a more positive tone than the word usually commands. His approach to buildings is so out of the box, I can hardly follow it, but his question, "So how do you make a building human?" is a great question to apply to anything you're designing. If a product becomes humanistic, it becomes relatable, and thus the people who are using it understand and appreciate it more.
-RM
Monday, September 22, 2014
Matthias Pliessnig
Matthias Pliessnig is a designer who seems to have stumbled upon his design calling by accident while experimenting with steam bending. He now creates uniquely structured wood furniture, boats, and wall panels for hospitals, universities, private buyers, and businesses of all sorts, in America as well as overseas. He only uses air dried White Oak for what he does, and just air drying the wood can take 2-3 years. He steam bends the wood initially, after getting his design direction for a Rhinoceros modeling program, and holds it together with over 2000 clamps. Once the wood is out of the steamer, Matthias only has about 30 seconds to get it in place for hard bends, 45 seconds for medium, and 1 minute for slight. Afterwards, for about 2 minutes he can make slight adjustments, but even that is risky, and after that time, the wood is set. He also uses a jigsaw and laser cutter for any cross sections he has to create to support the structure. Epoxy, glue, wire, copper rivets, and scarf joints are all used to join benches together, depending on what the client wants or what the design demands. Finally, the structure is sanded, both inside and out, to add a nice finish.
It takes approximately 2000 hours of man power on average per bench, and the average cost is $44,000.
Imagine that!
Here are some pictures to feed your imagination:
-RM
Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Star Signs Field Trip!
Materials and Processes took our 2nd field trip of the semester to none other than Star Signs!
They are custom sign makers who do work all over KC (Arrowhead Stadium, P & L District), as well as Kansas in general. They work on environmental signage, wayfinding, graphics, and identification signage. Generally their signs are made out of aluminum (as opposed to steel) because of the lightness and durability of the material, as well as its flexibility in combination with other materials. They make signs for universities (LSU), companies, and businesses.
90% of the time, Star Signs works in aluminum, but coupled with that, they use polycarbon, acrylics, photopolymer, and vinyl, among other things. They order metals from "Phoenix Metals in KC, and use CNC routers and a giant jump shear (kind of jealous of their equipment, actually) to cut everything. They join things with fasteners of various kinds and welding. The final stage is printing the sign or attaching 3-D letters, and adding veneer. The sign is then sent off to clients.
Thanks so much to star signs for letting us tour their facility, it was quite the experience.
-RM
Monday, September 8, 2014
Field Trip to the Reuter Organ Company!
The Reuter Organ Company has been headquartered in Lawrence since 1919, and they are the one of four remaining organ companies in North America who make every component of an organ themselves. They create custom pipe organs for Churches, Colleges, Universities, Concert Halls, and the occasional private residence.
Many different types of materials are used in the pipe organs the Reuter Organ Company creates, including copper, zinc, lead, tin, sheep skin, goat skin, kangaroo skin, various types of wood, plastic, and cow bone. The copper and zinc are used on large pipes (over 4ft. tall), and a lead/tin alloy is used on the smaller ones, with 50% of both components. The wood is used to create air reservoirs, as well as the varying types of skin. However, only sheep skin is used when creating the valves that open and close the pipes. Wood, plastic, and cow bone are used to create the keys that make up the console box, no ivory is used to create keys anymore.
To form the pipes, the company has its own casting technology. They heat up the metal, then our it down a trough into a contraption that allows them to lay it out in perfect sheets, then allow it to cool. They also use slip rolls to create the pipes shape, and weld or solder the pieces together. All the wood working is either done with a saw, or with a CNC router for the complicated/large designs. As for finishing the pipes off, they will either polish them, paint them with automotive grade paint, or create "flaming copper pipes" by getting sheets of copper and taking a blow torch to them for a "flaming" effect.
One organ created by these guys can cost anywhere from $500,000 to $2 million and is quite a process. The design process itself can take anywhere from 3 months to 3 years, and the construction process can take between 12 weeks to 6 months. Since their opening, they've created 2,200 organs from scratch, and restored just as many. To give a rough picture of how much work they do over that time period, I will tell you that there are 61 individual pipes in a set, but an average organ could be made up of 50 sets. The largest playing pipe organ has 30,000 pipes on it, although Reuter Organ Company can't take the credit for that one. They can, however, take credit for many organs all over the country, and a few overseas as well. No other instrument can go as low or as high as the organ, and it was the original synthesizer, so Reuter Organ Company does its best to serve the King of Instruments.
Our guide was also nice enough to play some organ music for us, it went something like this:
What a fantasmal trip! I quite enjoyed seeing the processes of such an interesting company up close for myself. Fairly educational, and I know I shall remember it a lot better than I would have merely reading about it. Thank You May! And thank you to the wonderful people a Reuter Organ Company for having us as well.
-RM
Many different types of materials are used in the pipe organs the Reuter Organ Company creates, including copper, zinc, lead, tin, sheep skin, goat skin, kangaroo skin, various types of wood, plastic, and cow bone. The copper and zinc are used on large pipes (over 4ft. tall), and a lead/tin alloy is used on the smaller ones, with 50% of both components. The wood is used to create air reservoirs, as well as the varying types of skin. However, only sheep skin is used when creating the valves that open and close the pipes. Wood, plastic, and cow bone are used to create the keys that make up the console box, no ivory is used to create keys anymore.
To form the pipes, the company has its own casting technology. They heat up the metal, then our it down a trough into a contraption that allows them to lay it out in perfect sheets, then allow it to cool. They also use slip rolls to create the pipes shape, and weld or solder the pieces together. All the wood working is either done with a saw, or with a CNC router for the complicated/large designs. As for finishing the pipes off, they will either polish them, paint them with automotive grade paint, or create "flaming copper pipes" by getting sheets of copper and taking a blow torch to them for a "flaming" effect.
One organ created by these guys can cost anywhere from $500,000 to $2 million and is quite a process. The design process itself can take anywhere from 3 months to 3 years, and the construction process can take between 12 weeks to 6 months. Since their opening, they've created 2,200 organs from scratch, and restored just as many. To give a rough picture of how much work they do over that time period, I will tell you that there are 61 individual pipes in a set, but an average organ could be made up of 50 sets. The largest playing pipe organ has 30,000 pipes on it, although Reuter Organ Company can't take the credit for that one. They can, however, take credit for many organs all over the country, and a few overseas as well. No other instrument can go as low or as high as the organ, and it was the original synthesizer, so Reuter Organ Company does its best to serve the King of Instruments.
Our guide was also nice enough to play some organ music for us, it went something like this:
What a fantasmal trip! I quite enjoyed seeing the processes of such an interesting company up close for myself. Fairly educational, and I know I shall remember it a lot better than I would have merely reading about it. Thank You May! And thank you to the wonderful people a Reuter Organ Company for having us as well.
-RM
Show and Tell Round 1
For our Materials and Processes class, we were asked to pick an object and investigate the materials used to make it and the technology used to form it. I chose my Tungsten Carbide ring coated in 18 K Gold with Freshwater Pearl Inlay, and here is what I found out about it.
The ring could not be made with a base of Tungsten alone, because Tungsten on its own is too fragile. The base, therefore, is a Tungsten Carbide alloy which is ground up into powder using a pulverizer, and then compression molded (high pressure molding) into the shape of the ring. This mold is fired at that point in a 6000 degree, oxygen free furnace.
This ring base is dipped in gold after cooling, and the gold is bonded to the base using electrical currents and hand polished with a diamond compound for "shine".
A laser cutter cuts out the shape for the inlay in the ring, as well as the shape of the inlay itself, and the freshwater pearl pieces are attached using adhesive.
If engraving is requested (it's on a customer need basis in some cases), a laser engraver is used.
Cloud9Tungsten is the designer and producer of my particular ring.
The ring could not be made with a base of Tungsten alone, because Tungsten on its own is too fragile. The base, therefore, is a Tungsten Carbide alloy which is ground up into powder using a pulverizer, and then compression molded (high pressure molding) into the shape of the ring. This mold is fired at that point in a 6000 degree, oxygen free furnace.
This ring base is dipped in gold after cooling, and the gold is bonded to the base using electrical currents and hand polished with a diamond compound for "shine".
A laser cutter cuts out the shape for the inlay in the ring, as well as the shape of the inlay itself, and the freshwater pearl pieces are attached using adhesive.
If engraving is requested (it's on a customer need basis in some cases), a laser engraver is used.
Cloud9Tungsten is the designer and producer of my particular ring.
Enjoy!
-RM
Structure Skin Lite Light Project Inspirations
Our first project of the semester would be the Lite/Light project, where we are to make a light fixture out of aluminum. As you can imagine, we began the brainstorming process right away, and what I like to do in my creative process is look up ridiculous examples of whatever I'm supposed to be making. So, here are some zany light fixtures that I found on the interweb. Some are ridiculous, but some are also just classy and inspiring, so I found a need to include them.
That was what I started out with, at least. Our class then moved to "what can inspire a lamp that most definitely is not a lamp?" We were asked to choose 3 concepts and draw pictures from these three. I chose proposal boxes, snowflakes, and temples.
Those drawings turned out something like this:
Definitely wondering how this will turn out. Well, wish me luck!
-RM
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