Today, we were to test our platforms to the load of 100N. Our platform being one of the lightest was near to last to be tested. A lot of tension was in the air, having seen some decent designs fail before us we were a little apprehensive about testing ours.

Obviously, no comiserations were needed for the DSMT platform; it clearly stood robust to the load, despite the fact the applied load was practically 650 times its own mass.

I have compiled a little clip for your pleasure. Enjoy!

(Requires Windows Media Player 9 – 6.51MBs)

I should have said, the load had to be applied in 3 stages: Firstly at 30N then at 60N and then to 100N, this would explain why Rob is leaning back for the Lecturer to see.

For those of you who don’t know what a DSMT platform is, it stands for: Daniel Steward Memorial Tower Platform. Yup, Dan was a great team member who helped us build Solarbo last year and manage to help us produce gigantic assignments with heaps of waffle and extensive vocabular. Although there is a slight falacy in the title, he isn’t dead so we’re not mourning his death with this structure, just he left this degree we’re studying to find himself a proper vocation instead of this pseudo education we’re recieving.

For one of our design modules we have been set the task of producing a platform that is 400mm high, covering a surface area of 100x100mm and must sustain a mass of 100N and weigh as little as possible ideally 20grams although anything less would be marked higher.

After poking about with a few concepts for a design we finally settled for Rob’s design, partly because his design had calculation beside it and partly because I designed Solarbo… let us not remember what happened to poor old Solarbo.

Anyhow; the process in 4 simple steps:

1. Create a Template:
   
   Having done this, start positing the pieces.
2. Cut the Pieces:
   
   Obviously this goes before stage 1, but that isn’t the order I took the pictures in.
3. Right Angles:
   
   We used a large block of steel section that was square as a template. Attaching a chunk of thick balsa to it with tape we were able to pin the vertical piece of the structure to the chunk and squared that to the template so we were able to resume construction.
4. Inner Fixtures:
   
   After assembling the two halves of the design; we decided that internal torsional restraints should be put in to control the movement (or lack of).
5. Finally:
   
   After completing the whole of the two halves we assembled the parts effortlessly, then developed webbed flanges to disperse the load on the platform surface and similarly extended the legs’ footprint on the ground for more stability. Total weight/mass: 15.6 grams

I’ll let you know how the testing goes tomorrow. Enjoy!

*Updatey bit*
More pictures available here.

Today I have been all day training to get my CBT (Compulsary Basic Training) for riding a motorcycle on the road. Despite a few hick-ups this morning I had a great time and now 1 step closer to being on the road. I have booked my test for the 1st December.

Oh and…Friday I bought myself a new jacket for the bike, I love it to bits (pictured below). Saturday I spent most of the day, (well, besides watching Lost with Natti;) I was mostly focusing on redecorating my new bedroom. When I say redecorating, I mean skimming, note how the walls look behind me in the photo. I’m applying a thin coat of plaster to cover all the dents and cracks and chips missing in the wall and giving it a nice smooth finish.

Abrupt ending.

I feel strongly about how people mis-lable themselves and expect you to believe them (…much like banage below).

Why should we expect a self proclamation to be true? For example: a bus that says “Deluxe service”, on whose standard are they basing their statement? Worse still are those convenience shops that title themselves “Quality …” It neither refers to good nor bad quality; merely that there is a reference to the fact that quality was an issue when naming the shop.

Crazy!

Natti keeps telling me that I have a really pretty helmet. So I deceded to share my helmet off to the rest of the world.
Here ya go:

As you can see, it is an Airoh helmet, Firefox to be precise. The goggles are Oakley O goggles…. and the whole lot is awesome! The ventilation system within is superb. Ask me next time you see me wearing it to see the innards.

Having had another moronic salesman come to my door today, trying to entice me into joining a packaged telephone saving scheme that could save me heaps of money by moving yet again, I have formulated a new: “No! I’m not interested” response for those too dense to understand you are clearly not at all interested.
It follows as:

Salesman: “blah-blah-blah-blah-blah-blah……….”
[Interrupt obnoxiously]
You: “How much have you got in your wallet?”
Salesman: “Errr…?”
You: “Want me to find out for you?”
Salesman: “No!”
You: “Get away from my door space before I do something about it!”

Clearly this would deter anyone from even asking you; if you are sure you do not want to make fabulous savings; as they’ll be too concerned with the fact that you are going to cause them some injustice.

Try this next time you have your time wasted answering the door.

I don’t have any fart jokes but I’m told I need more of them on this site… please use the comment area below to append your filth to my beautiful website.

It being Autumn and it being the time of the year in which people are at their lowest; there seems to be a lot of arguing. At present, I’m passively enduring an argument between my sister and her boyfriend over the telephone. Which is a perfect introduction to the topic I wish to transcend today, that being the subject of: communication and of understanding.

The reality of communication and understanding has really very little to do with language and patience despite what anyone may try and tell you. It is far more simple than that, to do either of the two well, you need to understand yourself fully. Being able to see your own shortcomings and accepting them, then importantly knowing your true strengths with a pure honesty, is a good start.

I am fortunate enough to have witnessed many -many- arguments and from this I have derived my conclusion, that the person with the most agression is the person who least understands themself. Thusly, [as my sister raises her voice once again] those who listen when being shouted at, must understand themselves a little better. Now by all means, this does not mean that understanding yourself makes you be the person in the right, it merely suggest that you have little or less need to vex others to vent your frustration.

So why do people shout? Is it to make their point perfect clear to the other(s)? Perhaps show who is in control? Or maybe just a characteristic of an inferiority complex or weakness in the person who has no real valid point. Granted, my sister has been painting a grim story for me and others these past few days about how her boyfriend acused her of cheating on him; when she attempts to justify herself he hangs up the phone. Sure, maybe she is right, she hasn’t done anything wrong (recently), and he has no need to suspect anything of her given they’re about to move into one of the four houses they have bought together tomorrow. The need for shouting is for emergencies and moments of extreme physical distress, not a method of clarify facts to eachother.

Why can’t the world see this with any clarity?

p.s. Alex, I never shouted to you, ever.

Things don’t seem so bad anymore; they’re still bad, I have just stopped caring too deeply with them. I lost my job, there are others, I screwed up on the bike test thingy, there is always another chance to do it again oh and… uni sucks… what’s new?

I’ve been doing a few busy bits and pieces this week: Met Galit and sister with Natti, looking at bikes and helping my sister & boyfriend move… and that cracks apart all those empty spaces in which i could feel down about the misery of life.

Uni seems to be drifting along nicely… first reading week already here, starting tomorrow. That is always a good thing.

Natti and I are still having fun together, shame not everything could go as well.

How is everyone else?

Well before I say “It can’t possibly get worse…” I’ll stop and remind myself that having only said that yesterday it did get worse.

Besides the boots being a financial loss to me…. the bike test being another rip off device to making me poor. Only yesterday being belittled by the course leader at my university, by telling me not only that my course was worthless but also insinuating that I don’t have a standing chance in hell of ever getting past the middle management margin that my life seems to be constrained to.
To make it all better; today on a happy note I discovered I have lost my job.

Bring it on!!