Carbon Fiber Bench

Link : Carbon Fiber Creative Products

Carbon Fiber Point-Support Curtain Wall System

Pedro A. Hernandez

Carbon Fiber Truss - Section

Eduardo Balderrama

Interview with Prof. Shiren Wang

Monday, November 22, 2010

Conversation with Prof. Shiren Wang* about Carbon as a Smart Material
*Assistant Professor at the Department Industrial Engineer at Texas Tech University

We spoke to ­­professor Wang and we asked some of the questions that we had during the semester about how Carbon is used as a Smart material and what important facts did he knew about this topic. He is a professor at the department of Industrial Engineering and has several publications about the matter.

Carbon fiber is the one of most important composite that Carbon can produce, its not the only one, he told us that they are various types of Carbon fiber. The industry of Carbon has some of the most powerful material but is not accessible, since it is only available for military purposes, the type of composition is called M7, and according to Prof. Wang this is one of the most resistant materials available. For him Carbon Fiber is a possible substitute for steel or other materials but as we already know the price is what makes this material inaccessible.

Japan has the main and best Carbon Fiber material available according to some of Prof. Wang research, and well the most elemental question to that is why? He said that they are different types of Carbon Fiber to some being really weak, and some very strong; the key factor in this is the process of production. Producing Carbon Fiber is a long and precise procedure, and the most important part of it is heating Carbon to some extreme temperatures, this not only produces a good quality Carbon Fiber, but it bumps the price up.

We also asked him about his work nowadays and his involvement with Carbon fiber, and he is currently working on Carbon nanotubes as an element in producing photovoltaic cells and panels. He has a group of students working down at a lab from the Texas Tech University Department of Industrial Engineer.

He was very positive with the use of Carbon in the near future, since it is a very important smart material. He wanted for us to define smart material, since it contains many characteristics, but at the end he agreed with us that Carbon indeed is consider a smart material, for all of its positive attributes.

As a caution reminder he told us to be very careful with the little particles of Carbon Fiber, because they are so small (about .008mm) that they can penetrate the skin and stay there, creating a rash for a very long time.

Carbon Fiber Point-Support Curtain Wall System (1st mock-up)

ZOLTEK carbon fiber manufacturer

We have contacted this company and they have agreed on sending some samples of their product catalog, in their website they have very useful information on the past, the present, and the future of Carbon Fiber

ZOLTEK

Carbon Fiber Bridge

Awarded the second prize at the International Engineering Design Contest. Autostressed carbon fiber bridge. Located over Urumea River, San Sebastian, Spain. Span 75m, width 25m, 4 traffic lanes + bicycle + pedestrians.


Carbon Fiber Bridge

Other Uses of Carbon Fiber in Construction Industry

Flaws of Carbon Fiber

Company that sell of Carbon Fiber

Metropolis Article on the Carbon Tower

Metropolis Article - Carbon Tower

Contact Information

Peter Testa – Professor at the SCI-ARC in California, and member of the architectural firm Testa&Weiser whose most innovative work includes the Carbon Tower and the Extreme Textiles exposition. 960 East 3rd Street, Los Angeles, CA 90013. www.testaweiser.com,
mit.edu/arch/edg, 
mit.edu/edgsrc/www

Devyn Weiser - Current work includes collaboration with NASA to design the largest ocean-based alternative energy infrastructure; Automorphic Strand Tower. She is a big part of the project we are investigating which is the Carbon Tower. 960 East 3rd Street, Los Angeles, CA 90013. www.testaweiser.com,
mit.edu/arch/edg, 
mit.edu/edgsrc/www

We really want to have them either come to school to maybe give a lecture focusing on the carbon fibers, and talk about the technology developed to acquire such an important material which are the Carbon fibers. http://www.metropolismag.com/story/20030201/carbon-fiber-future

Peter Testa & The Carbon Tower

We have started doing extensive research about Peter Testa Architect, and its most remarkable work, The Carbon Tower. As its main material use, he experiments with a new material that is new to construction Carbon Fiber. 

Material Research

As our first focus we were indecisive on which material to choose, so here in this post we show three materials that deal with Nanotechnology+Architecture. Our main focus is that the material is applicable in architecture, making a significant change in how we see architectural construction.