Oasis

For this project, we worked as a group of 3 for the "Make It Heal" Challenge. On the island of Nuatambu there are citizens who have been afraid of losing their homes since 2011. To help fix their problems we decided to build an apartment complex with pillars at the bottom that rise with the sea level using water powered technology that is collected from turbines. This will give their community a place to stay safe and protect their homes from flood damage. The energy that the turbines collect will be used to raise the pillars up just enough to keep their platform above water, protecting them from the ocean. This would prevent the residents of the island from getting their home destroyed because it would rise with the ocean, giving them a home that would not be at risk of being lost due to the elevation of sea levels.

Materials:

1. PLA plastic
2. Clay
3. Hot glue
4. Wood sticks
5. Paper
6. Colored Pencils
7. Paint
8. Cardboard
9. Foam paper

Tools:

1. TinkerCad
2. Computer
3. Bambu Lab P15
4. Computer
5. Tinkercad
6. 3d printer
7. Scissors and box cutters
8. Wood cutter

Safety Considerations:

1. Follow proper 3D printer safety rules
2. Report any accidents
3. ALWAYS Wear safety googles when cutting the cardboard and sawing wood
4. Be careful when handing sharp objects
5. Be careful when handling hot glue

Estimated Time:

This project took roughly 2 weeks to complete.

When we first got together to discuss our ideas, we combined the thought of using pillars to hold it up and creating a place for many people to live and resume their lives. We sketched the idea on a whiteboard and created a place called Oasis.

When we had begun to plot out the island, we used Tinkercad, a computer software meant for creating 3d designs. We took advantage of their basic shapes tool and inserted spheres, cubes, rectangular prisms, and cylinders. Spheres were used to make the lumpy texture of sand. Rectangular prisms were made for the docks. Finally, we made use of cylinders for tree trunks. With our basic shapes placed where they were needed, our base for our setting was complete. Because this was only a prototype, we did not print any of the setting out, rather we made it by hand.

We first started with our base. We cut a 12’x12’ piece of cardboard and glued blue foam paper on top and layered it with blue paper. Our design is on an island, so we created a replica of what the island looks like. One member sketched the outline of Nuatambu and we cut it out. Once we had that, we filled it with clay to replicate sand. As we were working on the island, we textured the ocean with hot glue to make it look like foamy waves. We created palm trees out of wood sticks and paper, painting the trunks brown to make them look more realistic and glued them down onto the clay. We cut out cardboard docks and painted them in different colors. Finally, we added turtles onto the water for extra detail. Once the building was finished being printed, we painted it and glued it down to the clay.

Individual Work:

Our designs were all unique from each other. All of us had different ideas for how to approach the crisis of rising sea levels. One group member thought of creating a large apartment to house all of the island’s residents. Another member wanted to use pillars to hold up the island far above sea level so that the sea levels would stay below the island. The last member considered creating a large raft that the islanders could live on while it was held down by anchors so that it would float along the sea level continuously.

Synthesizing Our Designs:

Because we were unable to use two designs at the same time, we voted on combining our designs. We chose a large complex with pillars as our winner since pillars are the most common way to tackle rising sea levels. We drew our design on a whiteboard to decide how the building would be structured. Unfortunately, in the TinkerCad model there were some parts we left out because we could not add in visible underwater turbines.

We created a sketch of what we wanted to apartment to look like. When we finished doing that, we started to make it in our software Tinkercad to create and make that idea that we had sketched out. A rectangle will be added to the base of the apartment building around adding the rooms to the building, then finishing it off by adding a roof to the apartment. Adding final touches so it can look like an apartment then grouping it all together. After finishing the base and the building two of my partners combined their work together to create the model.

Now that our model was ready, it was time to print it. First, I grabbed a micro-SD reader with an SD chip loaded in it. Then, I logged on to the desktops and went to Tinker Cad to save my file as STL. After that, I went onto the Bambu studios lab, plugged in the micro-SD reader to the desktop, and imported my file onto there before saving it on the SD chip. Finally, I took out the SD chip and inserted it into the printer, loaded the file and pressed print.

Once our design was printed out, we decided to paint it. We painted our structure blue and made the roof brown. The platform, stairs, and pillars were also painted brown. That had completed our building portion of our final design.

Some tips and tricks that would be helpful is that you should always plan out what you want your design to look like so when you make your design you won’t be confused about anything because you already have it all planned out. When you are painting, make sure that it dries before adding another layer or painting with a different color. Use hot glue to create the water and speed the process of gluing up.

What I learned was that making the island took longer than expected, the challenging part about this project was nothing really, we already had the idea of what we were making. There would be nothing I would change because I do like the design that me and my group chose. I learned how to collaborate better with a group. The challenging part of the project was painting. I wish we had more materials to work with to elevate our design.

Our final design was made using Tinkercad and painted to make it more realistic. Although we could not add the turbines here because they would be underwater, it is intended that they would be in the actual design to constantly keep them above sea level. Because it is held up by constantly rising pillars, the rebuilding would only need to occur when the pillars reach their maximum height. That means that it would reduce the cost compared to having to rebuild the pillars every single time, and the energy would come from the water itself, allowing it to use a sustainable energy source. When looking at our island, everything worked out well. The clay looks convincingly like sand and the water looks realistic.