Thursday, July 30, 2009

MIT-UoN FABLAB DESIGN CHALLENGE

The newly acquired MIT Fablab at the University of Nairobi’s Science and Technology Park is a unique and exciting design environment created to encourage innovation. The Fablab is equipped with mostly table-top CNC machines will serve as a rapid prototyping center in the Science Park’s business incubator.

This new set-up requires furniture suited to laboratory work. The Science Park Management is launching a competition for the design of the furniture. The winner of the competition will receive a special mention at the forth-coming MIT Fab 5 meeting in India, and a feature on the Fab web-site. They will also be given the opportunity to be part of the team that fabricates the furniture using the ShopBot CNC router.

The specifications are as follows:

  • Working surfaces made from block-board which can be used for placing computers on (neat arrangements that ensure that cabling is barely visible)

  • Facilitation in the working stations for localized lighting so that work can continue at night

  • Lockable storage space for electronic components and materials for laser cutter, vinyl cutter, CNC sewing machine, laser scanner

  • Lockable storage space for workshop tools such as drills, hammers, vices...


Contact me if you would like to participate!

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi, I am a student of Architecture at ADD. I would like to enter the competition. Could you give me instructions on how to go about this.Thanks

Obie said...

@Gurmukh Good to hear! Just come over to the Department of Mechanical Engineering and check it out. Then you can know for sure what the challange involves.
You could also sample the machines that will be at your disposal should you succeed.
There are already a couple of Arch Students partaking...