#arch462

In our last Arch462 course we have our guest Onur Özkoç to tell us about his way of embracing BIM. We talk about how BIM changed effect and bring to the architecture and construction disciplines. There are three major topics at the presentation as change in demand, role of BIM and what we are goıng to face with BIM’s arrival. In the demand part, we see that the client we work with change by the time and their needs and expectations are also changed. Very big difference is that in the past there were patrons and let architect do what they know to do and provide the financial side of the work. However, todays conditions are differing as architect first responsibility is make his client happy and provide every need of him. “They say that architecture is an art but artists are free people, architects not.” I believe it sums up the condition. Clients priorities also sift, they consider time and money more than anything.  Because projects get bigger, number of people and discipline also increase. Here is the architect’s most difficult responsibility comes, architect is the person that gathers and builds the connection between every single part. Architects have very vied spectrum of work and making them took more time than designing. BIM’s major benefit is that BIM able the users, participants to work coordinated and cooperatively. It provides project to end in a shorter time with near to no mistake way.

         Our guest in lessen Tanju Ataylar give a lecture related to the fire and life safety. Fire protection divides in to two as prevention and protection. There difference is one is prevention is the studies that are done for not having an fire and protection is in case of a fire we see the effect of the design.  Design procedure have two types as, prescriptive design which provides the provisions and performance based design which provides  architect to be more free and focus to design.  Means of egress and compartmental fire zone are two important points in design for architects.  There are four key necessities that an architect should provide successfully. Travel distance, width of exit,, number of the exit and limitations on the travel path; these are the necessities that  should studied carefully and we learned some tips about these conditions. We majorly talk over travel distance and its varieties, as an example one beneficial tool is the have horizontal escape and I related to the escapes it is important to calculate number of people who will use exits. We learned the importance and the benefits of the compartmentation, it is very basically a room that in case of a fire that traps the fire inside a room. Last but not least we learn the naming and classification of the materials as REI (resistance, integrity and ınsulation).

In our lecture there were major 3 topics as high voltage, low voltage and generator. For the high voltage rooms we should not get inside without control and safety provided. In case of an unordinary case when we see an electric current by bare eyes around high voltage rooms we should immediately call authorities and stay at a safe distance. Low voltage current is what we use in our buıldings. Transformer is what electric engineers use for transformation of high current to low current. Generators are the support systems in case of a cut in electrical current; it is expansive because it works by diesel motors. There are two disadvantages as it produces excess amount of exhaust gas and noise. In constructions it is legal obligation to have one generator to power up fire systems and lightning in case of an extreme event. There are several types of generators that can be used in different conditions and needs but one important advice is that putting low voltage rooms inside the building. When we put low voltage rooms out of the building we have to work over the visual conditions and one that located out of the building have less insulation that ends up with lots of noise that will make people live around the building. There are 3 important conditions that are must to be provided in the design stage. First is all the doors of low voltage rooms should open to outside, second is there shouldn’t be any wet floor spaces on top of the room and last one is there shouldn’t be ant transit pass of other disciplines materials inside the room. Addition to these also the exit of the hot air and exhaust gas should be planed carefully. Another topic we talk was the lightning protection. Single lightning rod on top of a tower won’t work adequately. Rods also need to be design as architect’s and electrical engineer’s cooperative work. One last advice we get in lecture is working over renewable energy sources.  

In our lecture our main topic was how mechanical engineers and architects work together, how the process goes on and how we should manage the coordination. In a big scale projects most important and hard thing to achieve is providing an integrated design. Integrated design is needs hard work because there are too many persons involve to it and every single one has their own wants and needs. It is very tiring but end product provides too many benefits it many conditions as economic and time. It made you to do too many revisions but gives you more qualified project. A mechanical engineer should participate to the project not at the construction phase but at the very beginning, when an architect start to draw a design project an engineer should participate to the design, they should work cooperatively. Today’s conditions in big scale projects there are several project development processes and our country improved in the construction phase of the whole project but in developed countries they give more importance to the first the phase as strategic definition , preparation and brief. These two phases provide project to be effective in all ways and be more qualified for every discipline and participant of the project. In this state architects not just draw plans and sections but provide the optimization of all discipline and keep them together.

              This week of Arch462 our guest structural engineer Özhan Akay tells us about buildings architecture and static design relation. From over all presentation I understand that most important subject for the engineers is the earthquake regulation. Their studies are depending one providing the buildings’ durability over the protection of life and property safety. They work is for having appropriate structural design that fits to the earthquake regulations. There are several points that effects the design; having different functions (high-rise with commercial base floor), not just aesthetic and function but also high rent potential, national and international architectural standards, national and international project disciplines and geological data. There are basic 5 types of structures; reinforced concrete, steel, wooden, composite and masonry buildings. All both have advantages and disadvantages. In our country we most of the time use reinforced concrete because it is too easy to reach its ingredients so it is easy to reach large amounts of it. One another reason is that you can easily find workers who can work at concrete constructions. Even steel is more adaptive to the designs and able you to design more extreme in our country there are no workers that knows how to work with the material on the other hand steel is more expensive then the concrete as its construction coast. As I understood a structural engineers work is the calculation of the forces relations in every single part of the design. Because our country is on the earthquake region our most important concern is to protect a structure from collapsing in an earthquake. While working on a design projects there should be also a structural engineer. We learn that, ın our studios we aim to stay away from the symmetry in our designs but structural engineers want us to have symmetrical designs.

           We have our lecture with Cem Altınöz from Öncüoğlu Mimarlık. In his professional life he majorly works on big scaled projects and in the lecture he tells us about what we are going to face up in a large scale projects. What works we are going to do , which concerns we may have , problems that we may face with and most important one for me is that the connection , bond that we have to correlate with other sectors. In large scale projects, as an architect we are going to design for someone that also be used by someone else. There is a chain of effect over the decisions that we are making. In small scale projects our concern is to solve the problems of the person how is going to use the design but in larger scale, there will be an owner that has this design for some users. In this manner we should keep the balance between your design and owners wishes. In small scale projects there are few people you are goıng to cooperate. When the scale of design gets bigger the number of groups also increases that mean more and more people you have to get approval. Project starts with a design that shaped by the owners program requests than reshaped, revised under the needs of sectors. In large scale projects while signing the contract it will be better to also get the supervisory service, in this way you can have the power of controlling the construction in the manner of design itself. Provide from misunderstanding and misapplications. In large scale projects one important person is consultant that provides the healthy communication between client and you. When the project gets bigger, new groups join to the design process as; fire escape, acoustic, façade consultant, and ext. There are also some softwares that aim is to increase the harmony between all sectors. Provide synchronization with each other. This provides all groups to work simultaneously and synchronized which also helps to speed up the process.

               This week at Arch623 lesson Ziya İmren talks with us about the architectural competitions. For an architect, one way of keeping on your profession is participation architectural competition. The best an attractive part of the competitions is they provide you the chance of designing your own project without any forces. You get your projects concept, program concerns then you design your own. In business platform you are always employee and you design what your client want, you give your design decisions in the sense of someone else’s request. There are too many factors that made you do out of your free will. An additional benefit of participating on a competition, it gives you the motivation of doing more and more. If you get any kind of award, this creates the feeling of success and gives the passion of keep going on. Also you can choose what project you want to study, in business life you are responsible to do projects that come to you. In this way you can also increase the knowledge and practice of studying varied building types and programs. At the end if your projects gets first place in competitions you both gain financial support but most of all the feeling of self –confident. There are several problematic parts of completion, for international competitions while you are sending your materials there may be technical disabilities and damages may occur while transferring your competition materials. In over the entire lecture he shared his stories about his competition projects. Most impressive part of  participating on competitions give you lots of knowledge about the profession even you are not get any degree, you gain lots of priceless  values and you enrich yourself.

             In week 5 we learned about how to sustain a practice. Step by step; getting job to projects, bureaucratic phase that are must to be done. First step is to create an offer to a client. Then there are project phase then approval processes. In an offer paper, it should be written in a formal way that client gets the clues of your firms way of work style. Most important part of the offer is to define clearly and detailed about both what works you will be doing and what you are not. Also whole through the process in each step you should get an approval; make the client sign about what you have done. In this way there won’t be any misunderstanding about you and the clients that will end you up working more then you have been paid. In general offers have very brief information and amount of money that will be demand for the whole project with all sectors participation. Later İf the offer is accepted there will be design project and application projects will be prepared. Also at the offer there should be timeline of in which period of time you are submitting the several stages of the studies you will be doing. We also learn about the official documents that are needed to be got. At the end we learn how does a price of a project come out, how to calculate it and how to make your client accept that amount.