The fourth of my articles for the Garden Design Journal is about to be published. No. 3 was on water pumps on this one is a companion piece on filters. I was trying to put myself in the position of wanting to specify a pump and filter but being ignorant of where to start. Its not simple and I hope it comes somewhere close. Ive noticed that a few of the larger pump manufacturers even have apps that will help direct you to a product.. I have yet to try one of these, lacking as I do a smart phone..
The article for the July issue will be on Rapid Prototyping. RP as it is commonly called involves the creation of a model/ prototype directly from CAD data, eg from a 3D modelling packaging, such as SketchUp or Vectorworks. Simplistically a CAD model is saved as a certain type of file (IGES or STL for those who are interested) and emailed to a provider of prototype services, you get a quote back (usually very quickly) and if acceptable a model in the post, typically within a week. The process is relatively simple for “products” such as a new mobile phone, PC, mouse, gadget etc where the part/s being produced are actual size. But for a garden we need to scale the space down so that it will fit onto the RP machine. This scaling can cause problems; in addition plants cannot be modelled, except in a very stylised fashion. In the article I compare the results of 3 of the most popular RP systems however what is omitted is how to get your CAD model into a format that can be read by the RP machines. This could be the subject of an entire article and has been covered to some extent by others. I am happy to discuss how I do this ..but send me a mail (info@paulhensey.com)
Tuesday, 1 June 2010
Following the sale of my drawing board, my office looked strange, a small desk pushed into one corner and, apart from boxes of samples, rolled up drawings and scattered shoes, not much else. In my desire for a minimal look, I concealed the book cases when the office was originally created and as such I have found that I don’t “dip” into my reference books as often as I would like.. I forget that I even have some. So.. Ikea to the rescue.. and a simple wheeled shelf unit now sits in the middle of the floor. I have a strict system of filing and the clutter is surprisingly held at bay. The book case only holds a small amount of the books I have aquired but now that some are now visible, I find I do pick one up and leaf through. I will rotate the books so that there is a different selection next month.. so for now here is a picture of what I am currently dipping into.
Some are just references to dip into for visual respite, whilst others are used almost daily.
green buds cometh
it has been with some concern and a lot of hope that we have been looking at the bare branches of our olive tree. You might recall the pictures of it wrapped and heated during the hard winter and with a few weeks of temperatures well below -15C, I did fear that it might be lost. But this last two weeks have seen the emergance of buds and whilst it needs a bit of prune to take out the dead stem ends.. its alive and hopefully thriving.
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