UC CEAS Mechanical Engineering Technology
Ideal Bee Project:
Speculative Design
The Ideal Bee project was definitely an eye-opener for me as I had never done this type of design before. Speculative design is definitely a unique approach to design that I hadn’t really considered before, but I loved being able to implement anything I wanted within the constraints given. I learned a lot about 3D modeling from my groupmate Jacob which inspired me to explore a little bit of 3D modeling for some personal projects. This project also gave me the opportunity to research immune systems as that was something we implemented into our ideal bee. I now know a lot more about innate and adaptive immune systems, but a lot of the reading I did definitely went over my head. Still, though, I’m very passionate about gaining knowledge, and this opportunity allowed me to do just that. Below are some process pictures from our prototype and final design that I’ll caption and discuss.
Carboard that we lasercut for prototype armor
Our final prototype
As you can see, our initial ideas were kind of all over the place. I'm not sure about the others in my group, but I know I wasn't prepared for such an open-ended prompt when I came into class the first day, so I felt a little flustered. This feeling seems to have traveled to our ideal bee as it seems quite flustered as well, although it is kind of cute. The rapid prototyping session on the first day was again, something I had never experienced before, and although it seemed a little stressful at first, it ended up being super fun. We were able to successfully create something that resembled a bee in the time given. We were forced to make sacrifices which actually ended up helping us in the end when it came to the final design. Those sacrifices showed us what was most important for our final design and they helped us see what we could leave out. Our group wasn't too happy with the end product, as it was falling apart and seemed very child-like, so we chose to make a few changes.
CAD model towards the beginning
Final model ready to be printed
Model being printed
As I mentioned in the beginning, I learned a lot from this project. As you can see, our model and print were pretty intense (thanks to Jacob) and that allowed us to successfully portray our ideas. From our initial prototype, we learned that there was a better way to implement the "filtration system" that we planned to implement on the front of the bee. Its weight and size showed us that something inside of the bee might be a better fit. That's how I got into researching immune systems, something mentioned in the final graphic below. We also nixed the cute fuzziness and went with a little bit of a more realistic look to give off a more serious vibe. In the end, I think all three of us were happy with the bee that we made. Our presentation went well and we were able to successfully get our ideas across to an audience. In addition to these process photos, I'll add our presentation poster below.
