All posts by Nick Halsey

Concrete Canoe, PSWC, Steel Bridge

PSWC 2014 Day 1: Canoe & Bridge Aesthetics

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PSWC 2014 Started off with a beautiful day of Concrete Canoes and Steel Bridges on display!

  • Early-morning assembly at the hotel.
  • Full trailer waiting to be unloaded.
  • We’re here!
  • Waiting to unload the trailer.
  • The team prepares to lift the canoe out of its cradle.
  • Carrying the canoe out of the trailer.
  • Bringing the canoe onto campus.
  • Bringing the canoe to our display area.
  • Carrying the canoe to our display.
  • Setting the canoe down on temporary stands.
  • USC engineers ready for a busy day.
  • Carrying a canoe stand to our display area…
  • It’s WALL-E!
  • Wheeling a several-hundred-pound rock to our display area to hold the canoe.
  • Placing the canoe stands.
  • Preparing to flip the canoe over.
  • Carefully inverting the canoe for display.
  • Attaching WALL-E’s feet.
  • Assembling the steel bridge for display.
  • Assembling the steel bridge for display.
  • We need another small piece of wood – good thing we brought a saw!
  • USC ASCE NASA-style logo on our Space Shuttle Cutaway Section.
  • Completed canoe display.
  • Fully-assembled bridge.
  • Partial Canoe Team with DiSCovery II.
  • Our final product display table and space shuttle canoe cut-away section.
  • Our canoe cut-away section: a space shuttle.
  • Selfie with WALL-E!
  • DiSCovery II on display.
  • Our 2014 Steel Bridge on display.
  • Nicole with DiSCovery II.
  • Canoe team display.
  • DiSCovery II with its asteroid and WALL-E display stands.
  • Our 2014 Steel Bridge.
  • “The orientation of our canoe display creates a space where exhausted students can rest in its cast shadow.” – a building science student
  • Everyone loves WALL-E!
  • Nicole with our Final Product Display.
  • People view our canoe and bridge displays.
  • Not-the-canoe-team with one of our practitioner advisors.
  • DiSCovery II and the final product display.
  • Canoe Display.
  • Space Shuttle Cut-away Section.
  • Space Shuttle Cut-away Section.
  • Space Shuttle Cut-away Section.
  • DiSCovery II on display.
  • Our 2014 Steel Bridge on display.
  • Everyone loves WALL-E!
  • Our canoe captains deliver the oral presentation.
  • Carrying the canoe back to the trailer, to rest before tomorrow’s races.
Environmental, PSWC

PSWC 2014 Day 1: Environmental Competiton

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Our environmental team successfully completed their water treatment challenge to remove nitrate and phosphorus from a water sample, earning 5th place in a field of 15 schools.

  • Environmental captains strategize for their competition.
  • Preparing for the start of the competition.
  • Preparing to pour the water into the system.
  • Preparing to pour the water into the system for treatment.
  • Pouring the water into the system for treatment.
  • The system beings to treat the water.
  • Daphne shows off our low-cost, sustainable, water-treatment system.
  • Checking the time elapsed.
  • Waiting for the water treatment system to do its work.
  • Environmental presentation team.
  • Environmental Design Team.
PSWC

PSWC 2014 Day 1: Mystery Event

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Mystery event is an event where we send several of our members to the competition where they proceed to compete in several challenges that were not previously announced. This year’s team had a blast, fully embracing the spirit of the competition.

  • Team huddle selfie.
  • Many-legged-race practice.
  • 6-person, 7-legged race.
  • Environmental team captains cheer on the mystery event team.
  • Strategizing session between rounds.
  • Water balloon catching bullseye.
  • Everyone jumps for a water balloon.
  • Water balloon catch.
PSWC

PSWC 2014 Day 1: Family Feud Quiz

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This year’s PSWC quiz event challenged students with an individual scan-tron-style quiz on engineering topics in the qualification round. After tying for second (out of 18 schools) in the qualifications, we advanced to the more energetic Family Feud tournament for the final rounds.  We named “Occupations That Begin With the Letter ‘A,’” but had trouble thinking of “Things You Do With Two Hands.”

  • Family Feud Quiz Team.
  • Watching other schools compete in the Family Feud tournament.
  • Preparing to compete in family feud.
  • Competing in Family Feud.
  • Family Feud Quiz Team.
  • Our quiz team may not be as cool as they think they are, but they are pretty smart.
Misc. PSWC Events, PSWC

PSWC 2014 Day 1: Surveying

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Even though our surveying team was completely new this year, our 2014 Surveying team placed 7th in their competition!

  • The surveying competition was held in a… remote… area of campus.
  • Can you spot the surveyors?
  • Surveying team.
  • Captain Kelvin is the only one who’s done this before.
  • Lucy and Ben measure something.
  • Ben may or may not be confused about what he’s supposed to be doing.
  • Having fun surveying.
  • Measuring something.
Concrete Canoe, Environmental, Misc. PSWC Events, PSWC, Steel Bridge

Final PSWC 2014 Preparations

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All of our design teams are busy with last-minute preparations for PSWC 2014. We’re off to San Diego tonight, excited to compete!

  • Ben grinds down a piece of the steel bridge.
  • Ben grinds down a piece of the bridge.
  • The Steel Bridge team prepares to practice assembling their bridge.
  • The Steel Bridge team practices assembling their bridge.
  • Kelly holds the results of a failed concrete bowling ball test.
  • The Concrete Bowling Ball awaits its paint job.
  • The Environmental team’s system goes through a test run.
  • Cleaning the basement canoe area.
  • The space shuttle cut-away section, complete with cardinal red steel stands made from last year’s steel bridge.
  • Kelly and Lucy assemble the final product display table.
  • Admiring the completed canoe-staining.
  • DiSCovery II awaits its lettering.
  • Lucy applies a second coat of paint to the canoe letters.
  • Jake paints canoe letters.
  • Erin paints “Southern” onto the canoe.
  • Carefully painting lettering onto DiSCovery II.
  • Painting on the canoe & university name.
  • Erin paints lettering onto the canoe.
  • Touching up the canoe lettering.
  • Erin and Jessica discuss the status of the canoe finishing.
  • Jessica and Erin paint “DiSCovery II” onto the canoe.
  • Jessica carefully touches up the canoe lettering.
  • Painting lettering onto the canoe.
  • Removing a lettering stencil from the canoe.
  • Watching paint dry.
  • Touching up the canoe lettering.
  • Erin cuts out labels for the concrete aggregate samples for the display table.
  • Jessica goes into full-on artist mode while staining the canoe.
  • All of USC ASCE’s equipment and creations are safely packed into the U–Haul to head to San Diego.
  • WALL-E Looks over DiSCovery II and the rest of our gear in the U-Haul.
Concrete Canoe

Concrete Canoe Update

We’ve been busy putting the finishing touches on our concrete canoe and its auxiliary components over the past few weeks. Our cut-away section is a seven-foot-long space shuttle, complete with red steel stands (not pictured):

space-shuttle-section

Our two stands include a massive asteroid (made out of concrete, of course), and a special robotic guest:

asteroid-stand

We’re building some other cool stuff, including a canoe, of course, but you’ll have to wait until PSWC to see everything else. For now check out the construction pics:

  • Lucy and Kelly carve an asteroid out of Styrofoam.
  • Placing a concrete shell on the asteroid canoe stand.
  • Preparing to paint the asteroid canoe stand.
  • Team members admire the (shiny) DiSCovery I Practice Canoe as they remove it from the mold.
  • Re-lining the canoe with contact paper for the DiSCovery II pour.
  • Placing concrete.
  • A carefully orchestrated operation of mixing and placing concrete.
  • Mixing concrete for DiSCovery II.
  • Placing concrete in DiSCovery II.
  • Adding another layer of reinforcement (this time fiberglass).
  • Preparing to build a curing tent for DiSCovery II.
  • Assembling PVC pipes for the DiSCovery II curing tent.
  • Post pour-day-II celebratory team dinner!
  • Erin and Jessica assemble Styrofoam blocks to be cut into a space shuttle.
  • We just sanded a big block of foam into the shape of a space shuttle…
  • SC Traveler was finally removed from behind our building, to make room for DiSCovery I and DiSCovery II after PSWC 2014.
  • While SC Traveler was a great improvement for our 2013 canoe team, we’re hoping to reach new levels of success with DiSCovery II.
  • Preparing to place concrete in our space shuttle cut-away section.
  • Jessica sands sheets of Styrofoam into wings.
  • Freshly painted space rocks to accompany our asteroid stand.
  • Preparing to remove DiSCovery II from its mold.
  • Removing DiSCovery II from its mold.
  • Admiring our shiny new canoe.
  • DiSCovery II awaits sanding and staining.
  • Sanding the exterior of the canoe.
  • Canoe captain Jake sands the canoe, unafraid of the plentiful concrete dust.
  • Erin sands the canoe.
  • Tyler delicately brushes excess concrete dust off of the canoe.
  • Jessica meticulously sands the canoe.
  • Sanding the exterior of the canoe.
  • Erin (supposed to be working on the display board) says hi!
  • The first layer of staining is completed.