Eye Injury Demo

The goal of the eye injury demo is to show clearly the impact of airborne debris on eyes. Particulates that contact the surface of an eye is one of the most common and most costly injuries in construciton. This group is using an armature and porcine (pig) eyes to demonstrate the cause and impact of injuries. They will also demonstrate how proper eye protection influences contact.

The armature with eyes drawn and ready for drilling.

Eye drilled carefully with a Dremel.

An internal view of the eye socket.

The armature with proper eye protection.

Pinch Point Demo

Recently the pinch point demo group made the first see-through hand with visible internal bones/blood structure. The product was quite interesting. The purpose of the clear hand is to show visible damage to the internal components of a hand, which occur when an extremity is caught between two moving or rotating objects.

The internal components of the hand prior to casting the second half.

The complete hand. As you can see, the bones are black to show clearly. The bones in the second hand will be smaller and white.

The hand in the light to show the internal components. The acrylic wrist is still clear.

Soil Collapse Demo

The soil collapse demo team has made some excellent progress making a scaled version of a soil column. Their goal is to demonstrate the impacts of soil collapse on breathing and to simulate the actual lateral loads caused by collapsed soil. The team has built a soil box with pressure sensors, a bulb and tube design so that worker can feel the pressure that would be exerted on lungs, and a mechanism to simulate increased loads. Its pretty cool.

Zach and Cristina figuring out the pressure tubing, which will simulate lungs.

The pressure sensors in the box

Mar showing the removable slide to show the internal components in the box.

Nice work, team!

Making the first foot

Today our team constructed the first foot in the Live Demos series. The foot only includes flesh and an ankle bone at this time and cannot be created in bulk. However, the quality is very high. We expect to use feet like these for pinch point and falling object demonstrations. we can also show the purpose of steel-toed boots and their limitations. The "falling objects" team (Eric, Carl, and Zach) mentored by Justin Harter of Bechtel took on this effort.

Eric with his foot in the alginate! His foot will now be immortalized.

Eric looking funny with a block of alignate on his foot. Zach and Carl preparing to free him.

The team pouring dragon skin into the mold.

The final product. The only small defect was a bubble on the big toe that caused a small divot.

Kudos to the team! This looks pretty good.

A new logo!

One of our research students, Spencer Lacy, worked with a colleague (Sophia) and put together this new logo for the team. Check it out! Thanks, Spencer and Sophia!