Task 1: Sand Transport

At some point soon I will add an about me section, explaining a little better who I am, why I decided to enroll in this course, and what I feel I have to offer.  I have essentially no experience with blogging, and have always had a difficult time with keeping journals, so I sincerely hope that the content and validity of my observations improves as the semester, and projects, progress.  I also apologize if the inclusion of project objectives is unneccessary


The first day of the course began with short talks by each of the three collaborating professors, Max Shtein (engineering), John Marshall(art and design), and Karl Daubmann(architecture).  Each professor explained their interest in the collaborations that will be achieved through the course, as well as their ultimate interests and goals concerning the experience. 


I will admit that of the three, I recall what Prof. Shtein spoke about the most clearly, as it was a lecture I'd heard most of already in the non-Smartsurfaces senior design course for the Materials Science department. I'm also keenly interested in solar energy, which was a primary focus of the talk.  However, I did think a great deal, as Professors Daubmann and Marshall talked about the evolution of ideas, about how group members would be communicating.  We were to be working in assigned groups, which will rotate each week for the first few weeks, with two engineer, two architecture, and two art and design students.  I was excited to see how we would be interacting with each other as most everyone in the course seems to have at least some sort of technical experience, but from very different educational backgrounds.


Task 1: as extracted from the course syllabus
I. Objectives

• Deposit sand in specified locations
• Use only the provided materials and tools
• Utilize a minimum number of steps / energy transfers
• Present the design and final mechanism (winning team gets a prize)
• Teams judged on Efficiency, Durability, Economy, Spectacle / Delight of mechanism


II. Deposit locations
A given mass of sand starts out at a position 100 centimeters above the table; specified in
Cartesian coordinates by (x0, y0, z0) = (0, 0, 100 cm). A fraction of this sand must be deposited in
paper cups positioned at 3 locations given by:
Location:                                    Minimum Mass:                      Cut-off Time:
(x0, y0, z0) = (0, 0, 100) cm      100% of original mass             0 minutes (from start)
(x1, y1, z1) = (0, 0, 100) cm      50% of original mass               5 minutes (from start)
(x2, y2, z2) = (0, 60, 80) cm      50% of mass at (x1, y1, z1)    10 minutes (from start)
(x3, y3, z3) = (40, 40, 60) cm    50% of mass at (x2, y2, z2)    15 minutes (from start)
(xm, ym, zm) = (150,150,150) m Maximum volume allowed for your system


Provided with cardboard sheets, duct tape, dowels, rubber bands, paper, wire, string, and paper clips, and commanded to adhere to the judging criteria-Efficiency, durability, economy, and spectacle/delight, we began to discuss as a group our ideas.


The foremost thing I noticed about my group's interactions in the planning, development, and construction, was that everyone competed.  We all had different suggestions for the means by which the sand would be moved.  Everyone in the group, as well as the class, is very intelligent, but I still felt that everyone was trying to prove that their idea was the most valid and effective.  It may have just been the personalities of the people in the group, but we didn't reach a consensus as to what needed to be done until after we'd all made what we thought would work as a component and had realized what didn't work.  


We learned that more productive planning, i.e. designating a purpose and parameter specifications for each individual's assignment, a team manager to keep track of time and to ensure that each person is indeed doing the right task, and more genuine communication- not endeavoring to assert individual correctness as opposed to working to create something that works as a group.


I look forward to seeing how all the groups this next round interact after our experiences with Task 1.