Exploring Structure

As our designs for this year's SSEF competition begin there are several issues to consider. While the competition calls for designs based on the theme of recycling, the innovative use of structural steel and the ideas of biomimetics are also aspects which our proposals have been asked to address.

In terms of recycling
Although steel can be recycled by repurposing it for other uses, the metal itself can be made new by re-melting it in a furnace. In this process steel does not lose any of its inherent physical properties and uses much less energy than other products do to recycle. Consequently steel is the most recycled material in the world.  Essentially using steel means recycling...

What exactly am I designing?
Since this decision is up to us I thought it would be interesting to design a observation tower located in the forests of Vancouver Island.  This tower, rising up with the trees, would take you on an journey to an observation deck above the tree tops. While along the ascent to the top one would experience the different fauna and flora that live within the forest and throughout the varying levels of the forest. Yet for this observation tower to reach the tops of the trees there would have to be some serious structure involved... Vancouver island is home to some of the tallest trees in the world. The Douglas Fir that grows there can reach 85 meters or higher!

In hopes of building high I've researched some interesting structural systems...

Tensegrity Structures
Tensegrity is a structural system based  on the use of isolated components in compression inside a net of continuous tension. Compressive members are made of rigid bodies such as struts or bars while cables are used as tensile elements.

Tensegrity structures can be found everywhere in nature. Our bodies work as tensegrity structures. Our bones act as compressive members, while our tendons provide the stabilizing tension for any of our bodies configurations.

Although tensegrity is a well documented structural system there are little precedents for it being used in a architectural tower project (most of the projects you see using tensegrity are bridges, domes or if towers there just sculptural). The architects of the tallest tensegrit structure, the Messeturm in Rostock Germany, concluded the construction of their design by saying "Due to their inherent flexibility and irregularity of the geometry, it is doubtful that also in the future such structures will be much more than impressive sculptures"..

Although interesting, it looks like tensegrity might not be the way to go...

Hyperbolic Structures

In my research of tensegrity structures I stumbled upon hyperbolic geometry. In nature this geometry is found in coral reefs, sponges and slugs.

And as a structural system hyperbolic structures have been used for architectural purposes...

This just might be the way to go, but a little more research is probably needed...