Introduction

Team

House

Story

Sponsors

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3 october 2006

7PM, Architecture Building

The regular Tuesday night team meeting began as the architects and engineers started off the class period in separate rooms. Faculty Advisors Amy Gardner and Julie Gabrielli met individually with the architecture students providing one-on-one feedback on drawing assignments. Mentor Dan Vlacich gave a presentation in the neighboring room to the engineers on electricity and discussed the electrical system in the 2005 Maryland House.

An hour later, the full team reconvened to present small group reports. This was the first collaborative assignment of the fall semester between the architects and engineers.

The previous week, LEAFHouse faculty advisors assigned team members to 13 small groups, encompassing the ten Decathlon contests and three additional house-related subjects. Each team was asked to produce a presentation to explain “How We Won Solar Decathlon 2007” and in particular, how the LEAFHouse won that particular contest.

Students analyzed the 2005 Maryland house, read post-event reports from old Maryland team members, sorted through the scores and subjective contest summaries from 2005, investigated the systems performance of each 2005 Decathlon home and poured over Department of Energy raw data from the 2005 Decathlon for their research.

The Tuesday night class discussion took the premise that team Maryland had won the 2007 Decathlon and each group had to explain to a journalist the team’s winning strategies.

Many of the small groups provided practical suggestions to win the Decathlon, such as having documentation backing up each design decision to designing the mechanical systems to control humidity. However, some groups also threw in a few outrageous ideas such as using wind turbines (banned by the competition rules) and using nano-photovoltaic fabrics (not on the market). This provided a lighthearted dialogue and many laughs during the group discussion.

The end result of the Tuesday night class was the framework for a plan to win the 2007 Solar Decathlon and a team knowledgeable of what it takes to be competitive.

Faculty Advisor Kaye Brubaker talks to the enginers about the evening class schedule.

Faculty Advisor Kaye Brubaker talks to LEAFHouse student team members.

Team members provide feedback and comments to each other about posted assignments

Engineering students listen and take notes on a lecture by Mentor Dan Vlacich.

The Faculty Advisors look on as LEAFHouse team members make presentations.

Student Team Leader Dan Feng coordinates with Faculty Advisor Amy Gardner.

Faculty Advisors, Mentors, and Student Leaders hold a quick strategy session.

The Hot Water assignment pinned up on the wall.

Architecture students Lauren Kirkwood and David Whitehill share ideas with the rest of the architecture group.

The entire LEAFHouse team participates in the discussion of group assignments.

The Lighting Group report posted on the wall.

Student Team Leader Nirmal Mehta works with his small group.

Small group pinup critiquing Team Madrid's 2005 construction drawings.

A group report on the Comfort Zone contest and suggestions for a winning mechanical system.

A group report pinned up for team discussion.

Examples of electrical components and different types of wires on display to the class.

Architecture students Mark Rose and Lauren Kirkwood work with their small group.

Engineering student Darrell Smith has a conversation with Faculty Advisor Amy Gardner.

Students laugh when sharing research from the 2005 Solar Decathlon.

The team spent most of the evening listening to group presentations.

The team listens to group presentations of how Maryland 'won' the 2007 Solar Decathlon.

Mentor Dan Vlacich describes the composition of a solar panel to the engineering students.