Another Workshop Day

Since we last spoke, we have made a lot of progress, check it out! 

The base is completely done, we just need to assemble it together but as it is quite large and heavy, we are going to do so just before putting it into the river. As we estimated the weight of the wheel, we tested the stability and strength of the base: it can hold 130kg.

As for the axe and the wheel, well they are coming along great! Look at it!!!

 

Plan and elevations have been drawn to situate the location of the wheel (the red arrows) 

Take the wheel by its Axe

As for the wheel, we thought of changing the panels and orient them to an angle, simply for aesthetic reasons. However, we found that idea to be more work for nothing as we have to assemble the panels in the water. Therefore we came up with the trapeze panels (shown below). While catching most of the water with the panel's length, it is also aesthetically pleasing to the eye.

Heigh-Ho!

After all that talking, I bet you wonder where we are with the construction! Well it's coming together pretty nicely. Here I have some photos to prove it, have a look! 

On the left, we made one of the wheel panels. See how high that is compare to my classmate? And on the right, that is a quarter of the wheel done!

The photos below are the beginning of the base construction. We were figuring out if two long pieces of timber overlapping each other (as shown in the drawing above) would be strong enough to support the wheel. 

The Joint Creation of Architects

As we were drawing the plans and sections of the wheel, we had to start thinking how to join the pieces together. Below are some examples that we found and adapted. Bearing in mind that we have to assemble everything outside of the workshop just before or maybe even in the water, it has to remain easy to assemble and strong. 

As the wheel goes 'round and 'round

The River And Its People

Once we were given our brief and divided into groups, we made a model in balsa wood (1:50) to have a vision of what we are going to make and review possible problems we might have along the way.

 

As the wheel itself is huge, it needs a strong and stable base, as long and wide as the wheel is high, to hold it in place. We also had to test how fast the current of the water was since the wheel needs to turn. We can't have a stationary wheel, can we? What would be the point? Anyways, we had to go into the river and measure the width of the river!

For our base to be stable, it has to be placed on a rather flat and even surface. For this reason, we wanted to make sure that the rocks, and other substances that the river may contain, were movable. 
Look at those strong boys!

Our surveys of the river and possible placement of the base:

Let's get this started!

For our first studio project, we have to build a 4 meters high water wheel and install it in the river by our university. We are divided in 3 groups: the wheel group, the base structure group and the metal group. Each groups have a specific role to concentrate on, however we still work together as a whole. We will take you through our process with drawings and sketches; the problems we will run into as well as possible solutions; and our experiments. 

Therefore sit back and let us begin!