Hey Everyone,

Since we were talking about Prefab and Bensonwood, I thought it would be good to share this link– its a partnership between MIT and Bensonwood and has some really great information on it. http://openprototype.com/

Per our last meeting we have even more questions in regards to the selection of the materials in which to build box B and C. We will take the information provided by the current set of drawing that we have available and get pricing for both steel and wood framed additions.

The CM TEAM consisting of Colin Anderson, Drew Smith and Renard Purnell are eager to get layout on the Mechanical, Electrical and Plumbing arrangement of the DSH in order to send out request for proposals. The CM TEAM is anxiously awaiting these results so we can get to work!

HVAC / Mechanical Team

Team Members:

Bill Mahon, Petter Schmidt, Dylan Short, Jonathan Auman, Joshua Lessard

To all DSH classmates, the HVAC / Mechanical team is preparing to implement two main systems into DSH. We are researching and designing for a micro-duct system and electric radiant floor heating system. We are always open to new ideas if anyone has any, but this is the direction the team will be moving in for the midterm.

Mini-duct resource:  http://www.toolbase.org/Technology-Inventory/HVAC/mini-duct-air-distribution

Radiant Flooring resource: http://www.thermosoft.com/

The Architecture discipline within the class is focusing on facade studies, both within the neighborhood and on the house itself. We are all proposing to do several studies of the North and West facades in order to being idea generation process which will hopefully lead to a solid idea of what the facade should look like, via class discussion next week. This will help us to know what we should do via prefab components, and in particular we are looking at the idea of layers and which components we could utilize.

I may be missing some things, so I cant necessarily say I speak for everyone, but if I recall– this is our goal for the week. Therefore, hopefully for next week's class, we should end up with a solid phasing plan, floor plan, and general facade ideal, likely with an idea of how to work with the prefab components as well.

-Kevin

We have a great class working through the existing plans for the Smarthouse project, and everyone will soon be posting on the blog. Welcome to all, and feel free to chime in at any time; we really want to make this a platform for discussion to happen.