Last night at class we had to split into groups, chose one of our designs from last week, and create it in full size. I was lucky enough that my group chose my design (then again it wasn't too hard as at that stage there were only two in our group and Hannah wasn't sure her design was structurally sound).
We started with a large IKEA box (there's a story there which I'll get round to sharing sometime soon...) and some hasty scaled-up sketched from last week's maquette. At this stage I was cursing myself that I hadn't made time during the week to make up a larger scale maquette to test some issues I had with the original...
While I cut and folded the back Hannah worked on the seats.
Anna was a late arrival and helped Hannah with the seats
while I cut the holes in the back.
We had a trial run putting the two sections together (tape's not allowed on the final piece but we used it as tacking)
and discovered our first problem. Can you see it?
We decided it was an undocumented feature and soldiered on. Tara joined us after her workshop training and she and Hannah glued the chair bases together.
While I was in workshop training Tara and the gang created the internal bracing and attached the seat tops: 
It was during the final assembly that we discovered the second major flaw in my design (but at least it looks nice, right?) 
Here are the issues:
While I cut and folded the back Hannah worked on the seats. Anna was a late arrival and helped Hannah with the seats
while I cut the holes in the back.We had a trial run putting the two sections together (tape's not allowed on the final piece but we used it as tacking)and discovered our first problem. Can you see it?We decided it was an undocumented feature and soldiered on. Tara joined us after her workshop training and she and Hannah glued the chair bases together.While I was in workshop training Tara and the gang created the internal bracing and attached the seat tops: It was during the final assembly that we discovered the second major flaw in my design (but at least it looks nice, right?) Here are the issues: I used the average seated figure measurements sent to me by Sarah out of the Engineers' Black Book
but forgot in my haste to factor in the fact that the chair was triangular. Which caused both the problems.
1. The front of the chair is the correct width for an average sized human male but, because it narrows from there by the time it gets to the bit where your bum goes it's a bit squeezy. I should have measured across the middle part and therefore made the front a lot wider.
2. I measured down the middle of the seat section and used that measurement for the screen sides. Duh! Did I not remember my school maths classes? The screen is too short and doesn't reach the front of the chair. Which is probably a blessing in disguise as it helps alleviate the squeezy seat problem to a certain extent.
But for the purposes of the design brief the chair is close enough and not bad for a first try. (Although the pedant in me wants to sketch some more options and build another chair that addresses the problems with this one)
but forgot in my haste to factor in the fact that the chair was triangular. Which caused both the problems.1. The front of the chair is the correct width for an average sized human male but, because it narrows from there by the time it gets to the bit where your bum goes it's a bit squeezy. I should have measured across the middle part and therefore made the front a lot wider.
2. I measured down the middle of the seat section and used that measurement for the screen sides. Duh! Did I not remember my school maths classes? The screen is too short and doesn't reach the front of the chair. Which is probably a blessing in disguise as it helps alleviate the squeezy seat problem to a certain extent.But for the purposes of the design brief the chair is close enough and not bad for a first try. (Although the pedant in me wants to sketch some more options and build another chair that addresses the problems with this one)
So you Had to go to IKEA for your homework. Obviously.
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