Motivation

For those of you new to Steel Bridge check out the AISC's 2007 Nationals Video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yquKTMeoLO8

It's a good introduction to steel bridge, especially the fun and madness of Nationals.

As for our progress, the design/organization/fabrication meeting was great last weekend we're that much closer to having a working shop, shouldn't be long before we're fully stocked. It was also good to confirm that some of our previoiusly unattempted ideas are going to work as planned. We're getting very close to doing some real fabrication, if we could just get those darned connections nailed down.

Halloween Crunch Time

Final Detailing is underway, we've still got a few outstanding issues that must be resolved and we have got to get those connections finalized. Our fundraising / sponsorship / partnership push is in full swing and off to a promising start. We should be getting some new equipment soon and be ready to start working through some ideas with the real stuff.



Keep Hammering away folks, follow up with your contacts, explore the creative solutions, gently prode the machinists. Only a few more weeks until the real fun starts. Let's turn paper to steel.

Best "Nerd Cosutmes" Ever! They even brought props!

AWS Meeting

We had another great meeting last night with the American Welding Society. The AWS has become a tremendous friend to the steel bridge team, their wisdom, experience, and contacts within the industry have become an extremely valuable asset. We greatly appreciate the Kansas City AWS Chapter for welcoming us into their meeting again this year and hope that their are many more years ahead of us.

Connections

The shop drawings are off to the folks at CNR, they'll be cutting a few at different sizes and tolerances for us on the CNC so that we can test and make final decisions on the connections. From there we will be able to finalize the design. Things are coming together quickly, hopefully we won't need to make to many iterations with the connections to get them right.

Don't forget the fundraising, as always it is critical to our success and its much easier to do now than in the winter when we're fab'ing and practicing.

Who knew Gators Could Move so Fast?

Check out the 2007 Florida Gators breaking off a 3:30 Nationals construction run. The Gators are also showing off their hip dance moves and strange WWE pre-construciton routine (whatever it takes to get ready).

Hope we're there to see the Gators rolling in their own building, 261 days and counting.

Progress

We're down to two design concepts. This week we'll be exploring the geometric variations, connection layouts, section sizes, girder cross-sections, etc. for each of the two concepts. Once we've developed a healthy amount of options we'll model each of them, compare the efficiencies, explore construction sequences, and estimate construction times. This weeks analysis should position us nicely for another narrowing of options.

We've added more tools to our arsenal as we have a very good lead on a CNC facility willing to help us fabricate connections, which could dramatically impact some of the design decision we make. We'll want to move quickly on this front, though, because we want plenty of time to test any out of the box ideas we might pursue.

"Bolt Consolidation" Its never to early to consider, but be careful of the new rules.

Brain Pains

We pulled out the 2007 Bridge last night (it was only a little rusted, hopefully everyone has their tetanus shot up to date) to attempt implementing some new construction strategies on the new construction layout - builders, barges, assemblies, members, lots of possibilities exist.

The Good News first - we think we determined the most viable construction configuration (builders and barges) and we should be able to incorporate that into the connection design and layout.

The Bad News - We were slooooooow! Part of this can be attributed to inexperience with the layout and some new team members but it was obvious that achieving the times of last year was going to be difficult. It appears that being minimalistic over the river is going to be critical to construction times, but how does that jive with the importance of stiffness? Is it possible to make a beam or double truss stiff enough for it to be a viable option, given the decking envelope is it even possible to make a stiff simple span?

We'll take this information and incorporate it into our analysis, all together its shaping up to be a very challenging design year. We will be having a more formal design meeting next week, time and location to follow, so keep brainstorming and refining designs.

New Shop, Same As the Old?

Well not really. For those who don't know the Team has relocated to the our new shop, closer to campus and into climate control (wow, there's a novel concept), still no bathrooms, but the engineering building is a very short walk away. We are completely moved out of the old dilapidated joint, it will be getting bull-dowsed soon (if it doesn't fall down first), and we are organizing things in the new shop.

This is the pre-move in state of the shop (the buggies will be disposed of shortly)

We will be looking to build a new steel rack and some new tables very soon, as well as deconstructing some stuff that's in the way. We will have to be a little more conscious of conserving space, as the new shop is a little smaller and we will be sharing it to some extent with some other student-orgs.

We will be having a meeting sometime this week to begin discussing roles for this year, establishing deadlines, organizing design groups, discussing fundraising, and maybe squeeze in some design, construction, and rule discussion. Contact myself or Hunter if you've got questions or need information.

Fire It Up

Let's get this steel bridge season started. The designs are already circulating through the e-mail and our new fearless leader will be scheduling our first design meeting in the next few weeks. We want to knock out the design as quickly as possible w/o overlooking any details. There are lots of options and problems still out there to consider and solve, we will be looking for everyone's input in the next month or so.

We will be moving to our new shop next Saturday morning and claiming all the space we can in the new labs. Also, some new equipment is in the budget for the beginning of this year so everyone be thinking about what we could use to improve our fabrication.

Dream Big, Think Outside the Box, Be Creative!

Don't do this, it won't work to well.

Initial Thoughts

Woooo, that's a tight envelope. Seems like it will be tough to do a beam this year.

Hmmm Barges.... My mind is teeming with construction possibilities.

Good luck getting any work done today.

2008 Rules

Finally:

2008 Rules

Let the mayhem ensue.

MIT on the Web

Check out MIT's new website. Lots of good pictures, videos (Love the construction practice hype, much better than our 4 person practices (team included!)) and a very nice recap of all the bridges at 2007 NSSBC. Great Job.

Link Here: http://web.mit.edu/srudolph/www/Events/events07.html#010

Also, apparently "Role up Number Thingies", a.k.a. measuring tapes, are standard issue deflection gauges up in New England.

2007 UMKC Video

Find it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tD_WxG2zqk0

Regional Construction was a little slow and a lot sloppy, but it got the job done.

Boredom

There isn't much going on in Steel Bridge Nation right now, so I thought I'd post about how there is nothing to post about. I bet your glad you read this.

End of the Year BBQ

It was good to see everyone who could make it out to the first annual UMKC Steel Bridge BBQ, we look forward to making it a tradition to honor and thank all of the sponsors, alumni, faculty, and team for another great year. We would be remissed if we didn't take another oppurtunity to thank all of our wonderful sponsors, without you UMKC Steel Bridge wouldn't be possible.

2007 UMKC Steel Bridge

The Final Stats for the 2007 Bridge.



Mid-Continent Regional Competition (Lawrence, KS)

• Construction Speed - 1st (6.76 min. OUCH! those penalties hurt.)


• Lightness - 5th (258 lbs, Might want to mix in a salad.)


• Display - 2nd


• Stiffness - 1st (.35", Very impressive if we don't say so ourselves.)


• Economy - 1st


• Efficiency - 2nd (By 3 lbs, Why did we waste our time with that clear coat?)

• Overall - 1st (Can you say "Repeat"?)

Who doesn't love steel bridge competition in a closet, errrrrr... Knights of Columbus Building, the wood paneling, 70's Sconces, and 8' drop ceilings just added to the ambiance of Lawrence.

We performed admirably at Regionals, minus one "Nutsplosion", and showed off some unbelievable athleticism (those that were there know what we're talking about, but we were never concerned... Right, Captain?). Questionable judging was everywhere, a firm command of the rules and clarifications was certainly rewarded. Why can't we get the same group of judges every year?

There was certainly room for improvement on our part especially in the weight and penalty departments.

2007 NSSBC (Northridge, CA)

• Construction Speed - 20th (5.72 min. Almost flawless, except for one drop by yours truly. Wait, ah crap didn't push that ridiculous centerline piece all the way down (what the hell is that thing doing anyways) 50 lbs. later all hopes of a top ten finish were dashed.)


• Lightness - 33rd (316 lbs - 50 lbs (Weight Penalty) = 266 lbs, What? Our once overweight bridge is now morbidly obese. This after we spent a month shaving 14 lbs. in the shop, if all the scales in California read like the NSSBC's, it's no wonder Californians have self esteem issues).


• Display - 27th (Embrace the rust it is your friend)


• Stiffness - 19th (.82", A bad load case and a month more of construction combine to hurt the stiffness a bit).


• Economy - 15th (Not bad considering the bridge type and the number of beams in front of us).


• Efficiency - 29th

Well an unlucky day went from bad to worse to terrible. In a year when lightness was certainly rewarded (9 out of top 10 Overall were in the top ten in lightness), we were way to heavy compounded by the weight penalty and it all adds up to a disappointing finish to an otherwise quality year. Plenty of lessons were learned and we're looking forward to capitalizing next year on another year of knowledge.

2007 Nationals Recap

Well, L.A. was plenty warm and a nice change of pace for us "Missour'a Farm Boys" (Yes, West Virginia we have cities here with running water and electricity, the whole bit. If you don't get the sarcasm I'm sorry you must be from one of the coasts). But the 25 hour drive was a little out of control.

The competition went something like this:

1. North Dakota State: One hundred and sixteen pounds, and it didn't look a pound over 80. Light, fast, and efficient, What is there to say besides they're the best, again?
   



2. UC Davis: More of the same from this rising powerhouse, dovetails all around and bolt consolidation like no one else. The Dove Tail Tools were out in full force with a flawless construction. They got a little fortunate on the load case (as were many with similar center focused trusses), but that's the way it goes. Not top three in any one category just an all around fantastic bridge.


3. University of Wisconsin Madison: Another very nice showing by the Badgers with a lighting fast construction, 4.02 minutes are you kidding me, and no one got dragged across the floor this year. 1st in Aesthetics and for good reason, although that thing probably got a little warm in the California sun.
   

   Eerily Reminiscent of Last Year's #1.



4. Lakehead University: That was a nice beam, eh'. Fast and light the Canadians from Lakehead were the best of the beams. Some nice pin striping as well.

Other notables, UC-San Diego gets the What the heck is that Award? A very nice job thinking outside the box by those guys and gals. The Yellow Jackets also went away from tradition with some bent plate webbing complimented nicely by a flat black and gold paint job. The folks from SUNY - Canton get our compliments for another strong showing (from a fellow tiny engineering program) and a heck of a nice group of people.

Many thanks go out to the students and faculty at Northridge for bringing it all together.

Welcome

Welcome to the UMKC Steel Bridge Blog Site. I think we'll give this a go for a while in the offseason, see if we can be productive, hopefully I can find time to keep it updated during the season.